I think Pascal occupies a very privileged place in Nietzsche's imagination. He sees Pascal, Schopenhauer and himself as "evolutionary" connected in a profound way. Yet it's very noticeable how rarely (if ever) Pascal is mentioned by most contemporary "Nietzschean" academics who are professionally occupied with Nietzsche (see e.g.BGE.58).
The seriousness and respect with which Nietzsche treats Pascal (I think a strong textual case could be made for arguing that Pascal is, actually, the individual Christian Nietzsche respects most) is in sharp contrast to the frequently expressed disdain, contempt, and despair he feels for most atheistic "free thinkers" (a fact conveniently overlooked by most "Nietzschean" academics).
In a future post I will briefly outline some important points of contact between these two men (any interested reader should acquire Pascal's "Pensées").
I should say, for anyone unfamiliar with Pascal, that, although very different from Nietzsche in many ways, he is every bit as serious. Something as rare as it is significant.
Anyway, some important points of conceptual contact between the two, are:
Might is Right. There is no true "justice" to be discovered.
The inescapability of self-love in all our actions.
That our affects often (or always?) determine our thinking.
Hence, that reason can, as Pascal often says "be bent in any direction".
That life is essentially horrific.
That the overwhelming majority of people (including the educated) have no significant "existential" dilemmas.
Scepticism regarding the "self". Here Pascal is profound, but tentative, it's not something he emphasises. With Nietzsche, of course, the notion of the "subject" is frequently critiqued.
That our thoughts come from we know not where (or why); that we don't will what appears in our consciousness.
That the existence or absence of God is of supreme importance.
i haven't read any Pascal myself, but i did come across a piece by Ken Gemes on 'Nietzsche On Truth' where he says that Nietzsche's example of Pascal as a great man ruined by Christianity is "implausible". Gemes seems to see things the other way around, and argues that it was precisely by taking Christianity so very seriously that Pascal's thought became extraordinary at all.
Yes, i've read the essay you cite. As you'll know, Gemes offers this opinion only in a footnote, and offers no evidence whatsoever to support it. Given the importance of the subject for Nietzsche (and, one would have thought, Nietzsche scholars) it's astonishing that the subject is almost never seriously explored!
I couldn't disagree more with Gemes on this, but, given the extremely flimsy nature of his remark, it's difficult to take seriously.
p.s. I do agree with Gemes, however, in thinking that, relatively speaking, Nietzsche was little interested in "truth" (as traditionally conceived by epistemologists).
In WP.424 Nietzsche writes: "The profoundest and least exhausted books will probably always have something of the aphoristic and unexpected character of Pascal's Pensées."
How often does Nietzsche ever lavish such praise on the work of atheistic authors? Almost never. How often does Nietzsche ever lavish such praise on the work of theists or deists? Again, almost never. Why then does Nietzsche consider this work of Pascal to be among the "profoundest and least exhausted" books ever written and perhaps a model of all future books deserving this high praise?
Pascal was already, before his religious awakening, a polymath, his extraordinary genius evident in a number of fields. But both Pascal and Nietzsche were agreed that none of this, however intellectually dazzling, constituted "profundity". Pensées is profound because it won't cohere as a whole, because the parts are in conflict, and the reason why the parts are in conflict is that Pascal is driven by two contradictory things: the will to truth and the will to see Christ as saviour. Pascal's deepest hope was that there was no real conflict here, but his frequently displayed ruthless honesty entailed that numerous passages surfaced which simply don't lend themselves to an edifying Christian perspective.
In what follows I will not be faithful to Pensées as a whole and Pascal's intention. I will largely ignore the numerous passages where Pascal makes clear his devotion to Christ and I will largely ignore these passages because I find none of them convincing. Pascal's horror, despair and nausea at existence is very explicit in this work, and his flight towards Christ is largely a flight away from this existential terror.
Nevertheless, Pascal remains one of my favourite and most respected writers, a thinker far superior, and far more honest and insightful, than most atheist thinkers (including most so-called "Nietzsche scholars", who simply lack solitude).
I ask the reader to keep the following thought in mind throughout this entire thread: Pascal, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche represent three important responses to existence, and Pascal and Schopenhauer represent, for Nietzsche, two temptations that he is determined to overcome and move beyond. Pascal cannot affirm the world as it is without Christ; Schopenhauer cannot affirm the Godless universe and so advocates a pessimism of passivity and renunciation; while Nietzsche's whole project, by contrast, was determined to find an affirmative way out of this nihilistic abyss.
However, it is crucial to appreciate that the nihilistic abyss is real, and that those who understand this and feel it within themselves are far more related to Nietzsche's project than the countless so-called "free-thinkers" who now surround us. The typical "free-thinker", as Nietzsche long ago recognised, is not an ally but an opponent and obstacle in this project of self-overcoming, for they have nothing especially terrible, ugly and horrific to overcome. Such people are, understandably, looking forward to the arrival of the Last Man.
I will spend the next few posts quoting Pascal on some subjects of importance to Nietzsche. It should soon become apparent why Nietzsche held Pascal in such high regard.
Some remarks on the relationship between Might and Right.
"Of true justice. We no longer have any. If we had, we should not accept it as a rule of justice that one should follow the customs of one's country. That is why we have found might when we could not find right." (P.86).
"Three degrees of latitude upset the whole of jurisprudence and one meridian determines what is true. Basic laws change when they have been in force only a few years, law has its periods, the entry of Saturn into the house of the Lion marks the origin of a given crime. It is a funny sort of justice whose limits are marked by a river; true on this side of the Pyrenees, false on the other.
They confess that justice does not lie in these customs, but resides in natural laws common to every country. They would certainly maintain this obstinately if the reckless chance which distributed human laws had struck on just one which was universal, but the joke is that man's whims have shown such great variety that there is no such case.
Larceny, incest, infanticide, parricide, everything has at some time been accounted a virtuous action . . . The result of this confusion is that one man says that the essence of justice is in the authority of the legislator, another the convenience of the sovereign, another present custom, and that is most reliable. Merely according to reason, nothing is just in itself, everything shifts with time. Custom is the whole of equity for the sole reason that it is accepted. That is the mystic basis of its authority. Anyone who tries to bring it back to its first principles destroys it. Nothing is so defective as those laws which correct defects. Anyone obeying them because they are just is obeying an imaginary justice, not the essence of the law, which is completely self-contained: it is law and nothing more. Anyone wishing to examine the reason for this will find it so trivial and feeble . . . that he will be amazed that in a century it has acquired so much pomp and reverence. The art of subversion, of revolution, is to dislodge established customs by probing down to their origins in order to show how they lack authority and justice. There must, they say, be a return to the basic and primitive laws of the state which unjust custom has abolished. There is no surer way to lose everything: nothing will be just if weighed in these scales . . . The truth about the usurpation must not be made apparent; it came about originally without reason and has become reasonable." (P.59).
" . . . the injustice of our masters is not corrected by being pointed out . . ." (P.847).
"The bonds securing men's mutual respect are generally bonds of necessity, for there must be differences of degree, since all men want to be on top and all cannot be, but some can. Imagine, then, that we can see them beginning to take shape. It is quite certain that men will fight until the stronger oppresses the weaker, and there is finally one party on top. But, once this has been settled, then the masters, who do not want the war to go on, ordain that the power which is in their hands shall pass down by whatever means they like; some entrust it to popular suffrage, others to hereditary succession, etc.
And this is where imagination begins to play its part. Until then pure power did it, now it is power, maintained by imagination in a certain fraction . . . " (P.828).
"Power rules the world, not opinion, but it is opinion that exploits power. It is power that makes opinion." (P.554).
"The greatest and most important thing in the world is founded on weakness. This is a remarkably sure foundation, for nothing is surer than that the people will be weak. Anything founded on sound reason is very ill-founded, like respect for wisdom." (P.26).
"Right without might is helpless, might without right is tyrannical. Right without might is challenged, because there are always evil men about . . . Right is open to dispute, might is easily recognised and beyond dispute. Therefore right could not be made mighty because might challenged right calling it unjust and itself claiming to be just. Thus being unable to make right into might, we have made might into right." (P.103).
"If it had been possible, men would have put might into the hands of right, but we cannot handle might as we like, since it is a palpable quality, whereas right is a spiritual quality which we manipulate at will, and so right has been put into the hands of might." (P.85).
"Self-love. The nature of self-love and of this human self is to love only self and consider only self. But what is it to do? It cannot prevent the object of its love from being full of faults and wretchedness: it wants to be great and sees that it is small; it wants to be happy and sees that it is wretched . . . The predicament in which it finds itself arouses in it the most unjust and criminal passion that could possibly be imagined, for it conceives a deadly hatred for the truth which rebukes it and convinces it of its faults. It would like to do away with this truth . . . We ought not to be annoyed that they [i.e. other people] know them [our faults] and despise us, because it is right that they should know us for what we are and despise us if we are despicable.
These are the feelings which would spring from a heart full of equity and justice. What then should we say of ours, seeing it is quite differently disposed? For is it not true that we hate the truth and those who tell it to us, and we would like them to be deceived to our advantage, and we want to be esteemed by them as other than we actually are? . . . This aversion for the truth exists in differing degrees, but it may be said that it exists in everyone to some degree, because it is inseparable from self-love.
It is this false delicacy which makes those who have to correct others choose so many devious ways and qualifications to avoid giving offence. They must minimize our faults, pretend to excuse them and combine this with praise and marks of affection and esteem. Even such medicine still tastes bitter to self-love, which takes as little of it as possible. always with disgust and often even with secret resentment against those administering it. The result is that anyone who has an interest in winning our affection avoids rendering us a service which he knows to be unwelcome . . . we like being deceived and we are deceived.
This is why each rung of fortune's ladder which brings us up in the world takes us further from the truth, because people are more wary of offending those whose friendship is most useful and enmity most dangerous. A prince can be the laughing-stock of Europe and the only one to know nothing about it. This does not surprise me . . .[Now] those who live with princes prefer their own interests to that of the prince they serve, and so they have no wish to benefit him by harming themselves . . . [but] more modest people are not exempt, because we always have some interest in being popular. This human life is a nothing but a perpetual illusion: there is nothing but mutual deception and flattery.
No one talks about us in our presence as he would in our absence. Human relationships are only based on this mutual deception; and few friendships would survive if everyone knew what his friend said about him behind his back, even though he spoke sincerely and dispassionately. Man is therefore nothing but disguise, falsehood, hypocricy, both in himself and with regards to others. He does not want to be told the truth. He avoids telling it to others, and all these tendencies, so remote from justice and reason, are naturally rooted in his heart" (P.978).
"It is untrue that we are worthy to be loved by others. It is unfair that we should want such a thing. If we were born reasonable and impartial, with a knowledge of ourselves and others, we should not give our wills this bias. However, we are born with it, and so we are born unfair. For everything tends towards itself . . . " (P.421).
"All men seek happiness. There are no exceptions. However different the means they may employ, they all strive towards this goal. The reason why some go to war and some do not is the same desire in both, but interpreted in two different ways. The will never takes the least step except to that end. This is the motive force of every act of every man, including those who go and hang themselves" (P.148).
"The ordinary life of men is like that of saints. They all seek satisfaction, and differ only according to the objects in which they locate it. Those they call their enemies are those that prevent them etc."(P.275).
"Talk about humility gives occasion for pride to the proud and humility to the humble. Similarly, sceptical arguments allow the positive to be positive. Few speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, dubiously of scepticism. We are nothing but lie, duplicity, contradiction, and we hide and disguise ourselves from ourselves" (P.655).
"We do not keep ourselves virtuous by our own power, but by the counterbalance of two opposing vices, just as we stay upright between two contrary winds. Take one of these vices away and we fall into the other" (P.674).
"Pity for the unfortunate does not run counter to concupiscence; on the contrary, we are very glad to show such evidence of friendship and thus to win a reputation for sympathy without giving anything in return" (P.657).
"We do not care about our reputation in towns where we are only passing through. But when we have to stay some time we do care. How much time does it take? A time proportionate to our vain and paltry existence." (P.31).
"How vain painting is, exiting admiration by its resemblance to things of which we do not admire in the originals!"(P.40)
"There is no better proof of human vanity than to consider the causes and effects of love, because the whole universe can be changed by it. Cleopatra's nose."(P.197).
"What is the self? . . . But what about a person who loves someone for the sake of her beauty; does he love her? No, for smallpox, which will destroy beauty without destroying the person, will put an end to his love for her. And if someone loves me for my judgement or my memory, do they love me? me, myself? No, for I could lose those qualities without losing my self. Where then is this self, if it is neither in the body nor the soul? And how can one love the body or the soul except for the sake of such qualities, which are not what makes up the self, since they are perishable? Would we love the substance of a person's soul, in the abstract, whatever qualities might be in it? That is not possible, and it would be wrong. Therefore we never love anyone, but only qualities." (P.688).
General Method.
"Scepticism. I will write down my thoughts here as they come and in perhaps a not aimless confusion. This is the true order and it will always show my aim by its very disorder. I should be honouring my subject too much if I treated it in order, since I am trying to show that it is incapable of it". (P.532).
"Thoughts come at random and go at random. No device for holding on to them or for having them. A thought has escaped: I was trying to write it down: instead I write down that it has escaped me" (P.542).(cf.BGE.17).
"I maintain that, if everyone knew what others said about him, there would not be four friends in the world . . . " (P.792).
"Contempt for our existence, dying for nothing, hatred of our existence" (P.123).
"Man's greatness comes from knowing he is wretched: a tree does not know it is wretched. Thus it is wretched to know that one is wretched, but there is greatness in knowing one is wretched" (P.114).
"Imagine a number of men in chains, all under sentence of death, some of whom are each day butchered in the sight of the others; those remaining see their own condition in that of their fellows, and looking at each other with grief and despair await their turn. This is an image of the human condition." (P.434).
"This is what I see and what troubles me. I look around in every direction and all I see is darkness. Nature has nothing to offer me that does not give me rise to doubt and anxiety. If I saw no sign there of a Divinity I should decide on a negative solution: if I saw signs of a Creator everywhere I should peacefully settle down in the faith. But, seeing too much to deny and not enough to affirm, I am in a pitiful state, where I have wished a hundred times that, if there is a God supporting nature, she should unequivocally proclaim him, and that, if the signs in nature are deceptive, they should be completely erased; that nature should say all or nothing so that I could see what course I ought to follow. Instead of that . . . I know neither my condition, nor my duty. My whole heart strains to know what the true good is in order to pursue it: no price would be too high to pay for eternity. I envy those of the faithful whom I see living so unconcernedly, making so little use of a gift which, it seems to me, I should turn to such different account." (P.429).
"When I see the blind and wretched state of man, when I survey the whole universe in its dumbness and man left to himself with no light . . . I am moved to terror, like a man transported in his sleep to some terrifying desert island, who wakes up quite lost and with no means of escape. Then I marvel that so wretched a state does not drive people to despair. I see other people around me, made like myself. I ask them if they are any better informed than I, and they say that they are not. (P.198).
"Man is only a reed, the weakest in nature but he is a thinking reed. There is no need for the whole universe to take up arms to crush him: a vapour, a drop of water is enough to kill him. But even if the universe were to crush him, man would still be nobler than his slayer, because he knows that he is dying and the advantage the universe has over him. The universe knows none of this. Thus all our dignity consists in thought. (P.200).
"Men are wholly occupied in pursuing their good, but they cannot justify their claim to possession nor have they the strength to make possession secure. It is the same with knowledge and pleasures. We posses neither truth nor good" (P.890).
"All our reasoning comes down to surrendering to feeling . . . reason is available but can be bent in any direction. And so there is no rule" (P.530).
"The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing. . ."(P.423).
"It may be that there are such things as true proofs, but it is not certain. Thus that only proves that it is not certain that everything is uncertain. To the greater glory of scepticism". (P.521).
"Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it. It is merely feeble if it does not go so far as to realise that. " (P.188).
"Imagination. It is the dominant faculty in man, master of error and falsehood, all the more deceptive for not being invariably so; for it would be an infallible criterion of truth if it were infallibly that of lies. Since, however, it is usually false, it gives no indication of its quality, setting the same mark on true and false alike. I am not speaking of fools, but of the wisest men, among whom imagination is best entitled to persuade. Reason may object in vain, it cannot fix the price of things." (P.44).
"The strongest of the sceptics' arguments, to say nothing of minor points, is that we cannot be sure that these principles are true (faith and revelation apart) except through some natural intuition. Now this natural intuition affords no convincing proof that they are true. There is no certainty . . . Moreover, no one can be sure, apart from faith, whether he is sleeping or waking . . .
These are the main points on each side, to say nothing of minor arguments, like the sceptics direct against the influence of habit, education, local customs, and so on, which the slightest puff of scepticism overturns, though they convince the majority of ordinary people, who have only this vain basis for their dogmas. You have only to look at their books . . . I pause at the dogmatists' only strong point, which is that we cannot doubt natural principles if we speak sincerely and in all good faith. To which the sceptics reply, in a word, that uncertainty as to our origin entails uncertainty as to our nature. The dogmatists have been trying to answer that ever since the world began . . .
This means an open war between men, in which everyone is obliged to take sides, either with the dogmatists or with the sceptics, because anyone who imagines he can stay neutral is a sceptic par excellence. This neutrality is the essence of their clique . . . they are not even for themselves, they are neutral, indifferent, suspending judgement on everything, including themselves.
What then is man to do in this state of affairs? Is he to doubt everything, to doubt whether he is awake, whether he is being pinched or burned? Is he to doubt whether he is doubting, to doubt whether he exists?
No one can go that far, and I maintain that a perfectly genuine sceptic has never existed . . . Is he, on the other hand, to say that he is the certain possessor of truth, when at the slightest pressure he fails to prove his claim and is compelled to loose his grasp?
What sort of a freak then is man! How novel, how monstrous, how chaotic, how paradoxical, how prodigious! Judge of all things, feeble earthworm, repository of truth, sink of doubt and error, glory and refuse of the universe! Who will unravel such a tangle? This is certainly beyond dogmatism and scepticism, beyond all human philosophy. Man transcends man. Let us concede to the sceptics what they have so often proclaimed, that truth lies beyond our scope and is an unattainable quarry."(P.131).
"Contradiction is no more an indication of falsehood than lack of it is an indication of truth"(P.177).
"Our intelligence occupies the same order of rank in the order of intellect as our body in the whole range of nature." (P.199).
"Being unable to cure death, wretchedness and ignorance, men have decided, in order to be happy, not to think about such things"(P.133).
". . . I have often said that the sole cause of man's unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room."(P.136).
". . . but is a man not happy who can find delight in diversion? No: because it comes from somewhere else, from outside; so he is dependent, and always liable to be disturbed by a thousand and one accidents, which inevitably cause distress."(p.132).
"Man finds nothing so intolerable as to be in a state of complete rest, without passions, without occupation, without diversion, without effort. Then he faces his nullity, loneliness, inadequacy, dependence, helplessness, emptiness. And at once there wells up from the depths of his soul boredom, gloom, depression, chagrin, resentment, despair."(P622).
"I had spent a long time studying abstract sciences, and I was put off by them by seeing how little one could communicate about them. When I began the study of man I saw that these abstract sciences are not proper to man, and that I was straying further from my true condition by going into them than were others by being ignorant of them. I forgave others for not knowing much about them, but I thought I should at least find many companions in my study of man, since it is his true and proper study. I was wrong. Even fewer people study man than mathematics. It is only because they do not know how to study man that people look into all the rest. " (P.687).
"Our desire for the esteem of those around us. Pride possesses us so naturally amidst all our miseries, errors, etc. We even die gladly provided people talk about it."(P.628).
Have you read "Nietzsche and Pascal on Christianity" by Charles Natoli?
You say "Pensées is profound because it won't cohere as a whole, because the parts are in conflict, and the reason why the parts are in conflict is that Pascal is driven by two contradictory things: the will to truth and the will to see Christ as saviour. Pascal's deepest hope was that there was no real conflict here, but his frequently displayed ruthless honesty entailed that numerous passages surfaced which simply don't lend themselves to an edifying Christian perspective." I'm currently reading the Pensées and don't understand how you conclude this idea. Which passages that "don't lend themselves to an edifying Christian perspective" did you have in mind? It may be that I just haven't read enough of the Pensées.
You also say "I will largely ignore the numerous passages where Pascal makes clear his devotion to Christ and I will largely ignore these passages because I find none of them convincing. Pascal's horror, despair and nausea at existence is very explicit in this work, and his flight towards Christ is largely a flight away from this existential terror." Why do you find none of those passages convincing? What passages do you have in mind when you argue that Pascal's "flight towards Christ is largely a flight away from this existential terror"?
No, I haven't read it. What does it say? Are you a Christian?
Pascal takes it as self-evident that humanity is naturally corrupt, lost and that even its (nominal) virtues are vices. I assume you agree with this reading of the text since the passages supporting it are numerous and explicit, and I assume that you don't think this is an "edifying" picture of the human condition?
Nowhere in the entire text does Pascal offer a rational and well-reasoned argument that would explain and justify why an all-powerful and all-knowing, loving God, would create and tolerate such a state of affairs. On the contrary, he explicitly admits that the entire thing makes no sense at all!
"Without doubt nothing is more shocking to our reason than to say that the sin of the first man has implicated in its guilt men so far from the original sin that they seem incapable of sharing it. The flow of guilt does not seem merely impossible to us, but indeed unjust. What could be more contrary to the rules of our miserable justice than the eternal damnation of a child, incapable of will, for an act in which he seems to have so little part that it was actually committed 6,000 years before he existed? Certainly nothing jolts us more rudely than this doctrine, and yet, but for this mystery, the most incomprehensible of all, we remain incomprehensible to ourselves . . . This shows that God, in his desire to make the difficulties of our existence unintelligible to us, hid the knot so high, or more precisely, so low, that we were quite unable to reach it" (131).
It's interesting to note that Pascal generally doesn't rely on any "Arguments From Design" in support of his belief in Christ. Unlike most pre-Darwinian thinkers, he doesn't seem especially impressed by the (apparent) design we see everywhere in nature. The idea of a God as Artificer (or Watchmaker) being necessary in order to account for the bewildering complexity of organic life held little or no interest for him. His conception of God was not there to solve intellectual or scientific puzzles. On the contrary, his conception of God was deeply personal, troubling, visceral, and psychological. He found existence horrific, alienating and indigestible, and he could find no reliable escape from this suffering in anything belonging to the natural world. And, contra Socrates and the optimism of the Enlightenment, he saw reason and rationality as woefully inadequate to solving many of life's most pressing problems.
None of this is controversial, it's all very explicit throughout the text: a horror in the face of human existence and a profound and unrelenting desire to somehow escape from this horror, via transcendence. Christ / "The Hidden God" was intellectually incomprehensible to him, but without this Redeemer, life was unbearable.
This seems to me like a faith born of utter despair, by a man of extreme (physiological) sensitivity, and contrary to reason, evidence and justice. Nietzsche, in his conception and glorification of the Ubermensch, betrays the same basic tendency, alas. Although I sympathise with the sickness of these thinkers, I find neither of their cures and solutions persuasive.
I haven't read it either. I thought you might have read it or be interested in it because it talks about both Nietzsche and Pascal. All I know about what it says is from a Google Books review: "the book makes three main points. First, Pascal wrote extensively about both the grandeur and the weakness of human beings (contra Nietzsche who suggests that Pascal is overly preoccupied w. human misery). Secondly, Nietzsche’s description of Christianity is overly broad and in crucial instances downright wrong. Thirdly, Natali argues that Nietzsche’s argument bogs down in some contradictory epistemological confusion between notions of truth and notions of value." Do you have any opinion on those three points?
I am a Christian. Are you a nihilist? I finished the Pensées and now understand what you meant about the unedifying passages. I was trying too hard to interpret Pascal as though he were a Christian apologist and failed to take seriously all the unedifying passages, like the one with original sin you mentioned. I'm inclined to agree that Pascal viewed Christ as an escape from his existential horror.
Do you find the Ubermensch and Christ unpersuasive just because they are contrary to reason, evidence and justice? Are you looking for a solution that is not contrary to these three things?
Not having read the book I can only infer the arguments behind the his 3 points:
1.I'd like to know what kind of "grandeur" the author has in mind? Man's awareness of his own existential location, his longing for meaning and purpose, his ability to be obsessed with apparently non-utilitarian concerns, his extraordinary cognitive abilities juxtaposed beside their inability to establish certainty, his longing for a kind of moral purity that mankind is constitutionally incapable of attaining; these and similar issues struck Pascal as suggestive of a humanity both base and noble. And since he cannot satisfactorily ground this paradoxical nobility in naturalistic terms, he thinks that its source must be transcendent. The crucial point is that Pascal doesn't see any "grandeur" at all in a Godless universe, any "grandeur" that mankind possesses is not of his own making, it is a dowry from God.
2. Again, without the text claiming to show where Nietzsche is "wrong" regarding Christianity, I can't profitably comment. In addition, since there are numerous denominations, sects and interpretations of Christianity, it is very easy for a critic to respond that Nietzsche's criticism, in a particular passage, is too "broad". So I don't see that, in itself, as a serious criticism.
3. The conflict between truth and value is omnipresent in Nietzsche's text, but the review you cite doesn't give me anything to bite on . . .
Am I a nihilist? I'm certainly an atheist, but "nihilist" is one of those words that mean different things to different people. Briefly: I think a Godless universe presents us with some very serious problems and difficulties. However, I don't think these problems and difficulties are thereby rendered necessarily insurmountable. We're on a tightrope - we may make it to the other side, or we may fall.
Not sure I understand your last question. Some errors and delusions are beneficial to us and perhaps indispensable to some degree, but any attempt to consciously live "contrary to reason, evidence and justice" is, I think, generally speaking, a recipe for disaster, idiocy, neurosis or toxic dogmatism.
This is not, of course, to advocate a kind of Socratic hyper-rationality in the conduct of our lives. Both Pascal and Nietzsche were intent on seeing reason as an essentially instrumental and not a determining, autonomous faculty. But, between the extremes of blind faith and (a self-deluding) hyper-rationality, many other options are available to us.
Great response to Natoli in point 1. If I ever read his book, I will let you know so you can respond to point 2 and 3.
Are you familiar with atheist Luke Muehlhauser's work on the "problems and difficulties" of atheism? Here's a post on his blog pertaining to them (unless you have different problems in mind): http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=4841
Even if you didn't understand my last question, what you said worked as a response. I agree that consciously living against reason, evidence and justice is a terrible recipe. I think of 1984 as what the recipe ends up making. Have you read 1984?
When you say "the extremes of blind faith and (a self-deluding) hyper-rationality," I assume you mean Christianity and the Ubermensch.
Some Christians would strongly disagree that Christianity is a blind faith. I personally am not sure whether I agree that it is blind or not, but I do know Christianity doesn't teach blind faith, since Jesus supposedly performed miracles so the people who saw him would have a "reason" to trust his claims. Why do you view it as blind faith? There is a debate coming up that you can watch for free online about this question: http://live.biola.edu/. If you don't have time to watch it, here's sort of a response to the blind faith objection in case you want to hear the opposing perspective: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/what-is-reasonable-faith.
What I do know of Ubermensch, I agree with you that it is self-deluding and hyper-rational. Why do you view it as hyper-rational and self-deluding? My "reason" for viewing it that way is just intuitive disgust at its weirdness.
I've never heard of Muehlhauser, but i've some knowledge of Rosenberg. The blog post you reference is, i'm afraid, not to my taste. Much too bright and breezy.
I wouldn't characterise 1984 and totalitarianism generally as deliberately anti-reason, but rather the misapplication of reason.
No, by "blind faith" I simply meant the deliberate decision to live in opposition to reason, evidence and justice. I wouldn't characterise either Christianity or the Ubermensch as simply belonging to this category. I think there is a large element of wishful thinking in both of these things, but in a very sophisticated manner, in the minds of Pascal and Nietzsche; but neither of these individuals deliberately lived in "opposition to reason, evidence and justice". Both were very conflicted, subtle and anti-dogmatic.
My "(self-deluding) hyper-rationality" comment applied to an aspect of Socrates, who had, I think, too high an opinion of reason and rationality. Nietzsche's/Pascal's point was that behind our reason lay our drives, our emotions, our unconscious, our needs, wants and fears and that it was very difficult (perhaps impossible) for "reason" to ever be free of this partiality and contingency. Thus it was "self-deluding" for Socrates to believe that his thoughts and his instincts were unconnected
Muehlhauser is not my favorite, either. Even so, I'm not going to let his bright and breezy attitude deter me from figuring out whether what he says actually is true in the intellectual sense, although I might not identify with it emotionally. What if he's right when he says we can live happy, moral, and meaningful lives on atheism? Should the the fact that I emotionally reverberate with the idea of "existential nausea" alter the truth of Muehlhauser's views? The same goes with whether his views alter the truth of mine. What if I handed him a copy of the Pensées and he said, "Sorry, Pascal is not to my taste. He's depressing and pessimistic"? Muehlhauser is entitled to his tastes and opinions, but what if Pascal's depressing and pessimistic attitude is a reflection of the true state of the world? Muehlhauser would then be self-deluded in a way or at least willingly ignorant. What if we are self-deluded or willingly ignorant because we refuse to hear the cheerful atheists out?
You probably already have a non-emotional reason for rejecting the view of light-hearted atheism, but I don't know if your rejection of that view was made with consideration of the "arguments" the happy atheist crew gives for why we should agree with the possibility of non-deluded, cheery atheism. You may have done so and concluded they were absolutely deluded. I have considered so far only arguments and thoughts from atheists like Nietzsche, Sartre and Russell who claim atheism makes life meaningless. What they say appeals to me. After all, if they're right, then people will flee to Christianity to escape the horrible pointlessness of life without God and Jesus Christ. It makes a good starter for getting people to think about Christianity. But, what if Nietzsche, Sartre and all the unhappy atheists are a bunch of loonies who had miserable attitudes and couldn't see that atheism was just as meaningful, if not more so, than Christianity? Then why are atheists everywhere continuing to wallow in unmerited misery? And why are Christians everywhere continuing to shun atheism because they think without God they would have nothing to live for, when in fact both camps are wrong? My point is we need to consider both sides of any issue, especially since failing to do so leads to disordered thinking, and I think you know that. My questions is if you know that we need to consider both sides of the issue, why do you so readily put Muehlhauser's perspective aside? Unless you already have considered both sides of the issue, do not expect to find any new objections or arguments on the opposing side, and concluded happy atheism was hogwash.
Why do you view 1984/totalitarianism as the misapplication of reason? How is it the misapplication of reason? Concepts like "doublethink" in 1984 seem deliberately anti-reason. Do you have a specific definition of "reason"?
Thank you for correcting my misunderstanding on what blind faith and hyper-rationality were referring to. I agree that our reasoning is strongly affected by our instincts and biases. Psychology shows evidence, like strangely thinking sugar prevents cavities whenever you want to eat a cookie and ignoring or explaining away evidence that supports the conclusion "God does not exist" because we want or presuppose that God exists.
Do I have your permission to quote you and use your work in a podcast and possibly in writing? I would reference and cite you.
Of course it is possible to live a happy, moral and meaningful life as an atheist. That goes without saying . . .
But atheism is not a belief system, as such. Almost nothing necessarily follows from this atheistic axiom. From this common root all manner of things can result which have effectively nothing in common.
With regards to the "meaning of existence" question: there is no discernible cosmic, metaphysical, transcendent "meaning" to our lives. But it does not follow that because we lack transcendent validation that our lives are rendered meaningless for us, as living, embodied beings. This would be to continue to apply Platonic / Christian / Metaphysical value judgements after we had abandoned those foundational belief-systems. This is the sort of "nihilism" that Nietzsche repeatedly argues against.
Is our love for those earthly people and things most precious to us somehow unwarranted simply because it is not sanctioned by a (non-existent) God? Many religions say Yes. I, along with Nietzsche and Russell say No. Our lives have value (when they have value) soley because we endow them with value.
But, Muehlhauser's post left out a whole host of difficulties that may befall us in this life. And in the face of many of these difficulties, simply to suggest to the reader that the absence of a God is an adequate and commensurate response is, to my mind, beside the point and wholly inadequate. One can have no real existential neurosis at all (unlike Pascal and Nietzsche), and yet still encounter a life of severe suffering and anguish. Muehlhauser's post seemed oblivious to this very obvious point, and that's why I found it rather shallow.
Religion, in part, is a response to certain kinds of suffering that humanity commonly encounters. But to reject the religious response to these problems is not, by any means, to thereby automatically overcome these problems. But, everything depends upon the kind of problems we have in mind: problems such as war, death, betrayl, social impotency, lovelessness, psychological and physical ailments, deceit, fanaticism, hatred, violence, corruption, toxic ignorance and dogmatism, time, apathy, legalised injustice, extreme poverty etc - in short, "the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to" (Hamlet) - these problems won't simply vanish because of atheism.
As I say, atheism isn't itself a world-view of any practical and discernible content. It's simply the rejection of a very specific metaphysical axiom. The atheist has emptied his cup of God (more correctly, the concept of God), but all manner of things may take its place, both good and bad, sublime and horrific.
1984, and the kinds of left-wing totalitarianism that Orwell fought against grew out of, in part, a flawed quasi-rationalistic project from the Enlightenment, through to Marx and beyond. Most of the leading intellectuals of this movement thought of themselves as heirs of this rationalistic tradition, opportunists, hypocrites and idiots aside. But it should be obvious that as soon as things become dogmatic, and self-correcting mechanisms are henceforth forbidden, things have descended into tyranny and farce. Right-wing forms of totalitarianism, admittedly, are somewhat differently "grounded" and have a "Romantic" element pushed to the foreground.
In addition, there are kinds of irrationality that an individual may adopt that are not easily universalised. Why? Because the former effects fewer people (or fewer powerful people), and therefore encounters relatively weak social resistance.
You are free to use my comments in any manner you see fit, on the understanding that I may not endorse your interpretation of those comments. Thanks for asking.
I do agree that any person, atheist or not, can live a so-called happy, moral, and meaningful life. My point was whether living a happy, moral, and meaningful life on atheism, or Christianity, or Islam etc. is consistent with these views or is it a form of self-delusion. As you say, atheism doesn't claim that morality, happiness and meaning are impossible. It doesn't say anything on those matters. It just denies the existence of God. Even so, I've heard (as you also mention) atheists and theists alike claiming that a consequence of atheism is that there is no meaning or objective morality. But you, as an atheist, say that we can endow value to our lives. Do you mean that we think there is value to our lives, feel value and subjectively perceive value even though there isn't any such thing, or do you mean that there really is value and it isn't just in our minds? As a follow-up question I'd like to ask you why you see it the way you do?
Your point on Muehlhauser neglecting the problem of evil is well-taken. I searched on his blog and it didn't look like he addressed it in any posts in relation to atheism, just in relation to theism.
I understand now what you meant by "misapplication of reason." I agree with you then.
When I say "moral" and "meaningful" I mean from the viewpoint of the individual concerned or from the community to which they belong. These terms don't have any intrinsic or pre-existing status.
Many religious people don't realise that, if they really think things through, they also share this viewpoint.
Consider: is X good because it is "good-in-itself", or is X good soley because God decrees it so? From a theist perspective, can X be good even if God decrees it bad or indifferent? Every theist i've encountered says No, they say that X is good, not because it is good-in-itself, but because God deems it so, and that God has, in principle, total freedom in the realm of morality. i.e. God can deem literally anything good or bad and is not constrained by any conceptions of good or evil outside himself.
What this means is that good is defined wholly by God's power and not by any standard of morality independent of God. From a theist perspective, good is whatever God says is good, there is no "good-in-itself"; therefore there is no "objective" morality, even from a theist perspective.
To claim that there is a genuinely "objective" morality means that even God would be bound by it and could, in principle, be rightfully judged bad by it. But the question then immediately arises - what is the source of authority of this so-called "objective morality" if it is not God? And the same arguments apply to the concept of "meaning".
Accordingly, I don't believe in any genuinely "objective" morality, and I think both theists and atheists are in the same boat here (even if many theists think otherwise).
Regarding your follow up question: intrinsic "value" does not reside in rocks or plants, or weather, it is a concept unintelligible independent of mind. But, and this is the crucial point, everything doesn't somehow become automatically hollow for us in the absence of a Divine mind, legitimising things. Historically, we have been told that things only have value because a source high above us endows things with value. This was an understandable error, but it was an error nevertheless.
I see no reason why my love and concern for my children, my wife, my parents and friends, and my concern for my own well-being should not be self-sustaining and in need of outside validation.
Put simply:
Wife/Child - "Do you love me and care for me, and yourself also"?
Theist - "Yes, of course I do".
Wife/Child - "Why"?
Theist - "Ultimately, because God exists and approves of it".
Wife/Child - "What if God didn't exist"?
Theist - "Then you and the entire world would mean absolutely nothing to me".
Wife/Child - "Then you don't really love us and yourself at all. You only love God".
Theist - "Correct".
An unspeakable amount of unnecessary suffering has been caused by this viewpoint.
Broadly speaking, I think there are two types of "religious" people. On the one hand, there are those who are personally troubled by earthly suffering who seek redemption and justice and peace via the concept of an after-life and eternity through the grace of a higher moral power. On the other hand, there are those who who use religion primarily to persecute and control the behaviour of others, and are little troubled by any "existential" pains. I have sympathy with the former but consider the latter dangerous and generally deleterious to human welfare.
Is X good because it's good-in-itself or is X good because God decrees it "good"? According to some, this is a false dilemma! There's no need to worry about some objective moral authority God must submit to. There's no need to fear that God's declarations of what's good are arbitrary, they say. The third option in this dilemma is that "God is good." In other words, good is God's character and nature. Good is not something we ascribe to God or something different from God. When we say something is "morally good" that's another way of saying that something is reflecting God's own character. Morality would be objective in the sense that God is eternal and his character is unchanging. Any thoughts about this view?
I would agree with you that your love for anyone is self-sustaining and perfectly fine without outside validation, but I only see it that way if you define love as merely a chemical reaction or entity in the brain. That would apply with any moral virtue etc. on atheism. "Love" would be a word representing that chemical reaction or entity that we are experiencing in the brain. Would you agree?
Any reflective theist can conclude, I think, that he ought not to love someone or something because God exists and approves of it, since that sort of love would be contrived, but that he love as a natural reflex (even if it could just be a chemical reaction) irrespective of his belief in God. Although, he might believe that this "natural reflex" is only possible because God exists and created mankind with that ability.
Thank you for that distinction between the "religious" people. New atheists like Richard Dawkins claim that only the second type of religious person exists.
I see no evidence that it's a "false dilema" at all. To say that "God is good" while transcending all other moral sources, is simply a euphemistic way of saying that "God is, above all else, powerful. And when God decrees any X as 'good', it is the height of prudence and expediency on our part to obey". It's simply another way of saying "God is power; hence good is whatever God decrees is good".
Nor do I see what could possibly ground the claim that God's "character is unchanging"! (I'll ignore here the fact that scripture has God frequently displaying a changeable character). If God's status as an all-powerful being is (axiomatically)true, then it follows that God's character can be as changeable as He likes, and that if God is unchanging it is soley because He desires it (for his own, inscrutable reasons) and not due to any other source of constraint. Moreover, there is something self-evidently ludicrous about us puny little humans thinking we can know God's nature through a priori methods. It's no small matter that Pascal often refers to Him as "The Hidden God".
I don't understand your point about love and chemistry and validation. Feel free to elaborate.
I know of no historically influential Christian theologian who thinks that our love for other human beings, qua human beings, can be considered adequately self-sustaining. According to orthodoxy, every time we love another human we are never to forget that the qualities they have are not of their own making, but reveal to us the fingerprint of God. To love this world and the things of this world, and to rest content with that, is, according to orthodoxy, a very grave sin.
The orthodox religious viewpoint, after all, is not that life without God can be good, but that with God it is so much better. Rather, it is that without God, life, all life, is worthless, meaningless and contemptible. Fortunately for humanity, no evidence supporting this claim has ever been forthcoming.
A large part of this, I think, is due simply to historical contingency. These religions arose and flourished in ages when the most appaling suffering was virtually omnipresent, and when a sense of powerlessness was very common among the majority of humanity. It was natural, in such circumstances, to shift the focus of existence onto a hoped-for after-life and to regard all purely worldly concerns as distractions worthy of denigration. In other words, the message was: "Don't attach yourself too strongly to any worldly person or object, including yourself, because at any moment they may perish or alter without your consent. And since our needs and desires are not met in this world, place your hopes in eternity and God's perfection and don't be seduced by the false and unreliable glitter of this earthly realm".
Societies and individuals raised in happier, more secure and manageable circumstances, in the midst of accelerating scientific and technological knowledge, are not the natural audience for this bleak message. Of course, the "existential" types, like Pascal or Dostoyevsky, for example, experience this "progress" quite differently.
I now realize that my explanation of the third alternative was unclear and incomplete. Here is a better explanation from William Lane Craig:
“We don’t need to refute either of the two horns of the Euthyphro dilemma, because the dilemma it presents is a false one: There’s a third alternative, namely, God wills something because He is good. What do I mean by that? I mean that God’s own nature is the standard of goodness, and His commandments to us are expressions of His nature. In short, our moral duties are determined by the commands of a just and loving God. So moral values are not independent of God because God’s own character defines what is good. God is essentially compassionate, fair, kind, impartial, and so on. His nature is the moral standard defining good and bad. His commands necessarily reflect His moral nature. Therefore, they’re not arbitrary. When the atheist demands, ‘If God were to command child abuse, would we be obligated to abuse our children?’ he’s asking a question like ‘If there were a square circle, would its area be the square of one of its sides?’ There is no answer because what it supposes is logically impossible. So the Euthphro dilemma presenst us with a false choice, and we shouldn’t be tricked by it. The morally good/bad is determined by God’s nature, and the morally right/wrong is determined by His will. God wills something because He is good, and something is right because God wills it.” (On Guard 135-6).
When Craig talks of God being “essentially compassionate, fair, kind, impartial, etc.” he does not mean they are properties we ASCRIBE to God, but they are “properties” that can be ascribed to HUMANS that we use when talking about God but which are literally DERIVED from God. All of the properties we humans call “good” are just the raw, “essential nature of God.” It is not as though God is “transcendant” to good, he IS good—not good as an adjective, but good as a noun (kind of like Plato’s Form of the Good). Notice Craig doesn’t say, “What is good defines God’s own character,” he says, “God’s own character defines what is good.”
I only have time to respond to your first post now. I'll get to your other posts sometime later.
Let me be frank. I think WLC here is either very confused or is being disingenuous.
He says: ". . . God’s own nature is the standard of goodness, and His commandments to us are expressions of His nature" and " . . . God’s own character defines what is good".
To claim that God's own nature and "The good" are unavoidably coextensive, in fact one and the same thing, is, as i've said, merely a euphemistic way of saying that "God is power".
The concept "good" is co-dependent upon the concept "bad", these concepts are mutually parasitic on each other. The one makes no sense, and has no real meaning, without the other.
Imagine, if you will, God prior creation. What would it mean here to say that God is "Good"? The word "Good" here is superflous, and adds nothing to our knowledge of anything. "Good" only makes sense as a concept if "bad" is conceivable or capable of being actualised. But if God is the only being in the universe then God just IS and all moral concepts are nonsensical, prior to creation.
WLC, on the other hand, wants to suggest that the concept of "good" pre-dates creation itself because it is intrinsic to God's nature, and thus the concept of "good" is valid even if God is the only being in the universe (strictly speaking, of course, the universe didn't exist at this point and God is presumed to exist outside space and time). The idea of the concept "good" pre-dating creation strikes me as mere wordplay and confusion because its counterpart, the concept of "bad", has yet to make its appearance.
His allusions to child abuse and square circles is, I think, deliberately obscurantist. A square circle is a conceptual impossibility because we understand that a square and circle are definitionally incompatible. We can see this impossibility purely on a priori grounds, but we also know that both squares and circles actually exist. The same can't be said of God.
All WLC is doing is defining God in such a way that he can't be refuted by any logical or empirical methods. All one has to do is say that God transcends these human dialectical and empirical instruments, and before long, you arrive at a God who is ineffable. But if it's an ineffable God that's being affirmed, then silence is the best wisdom, but in practise, virtually no believer conforms to this model.
I'm also astonished that he is attempting to portray something like child abuse (and, by extension, injustice generally) as being fundamentally alien to God's nature. WLC seems to be saying, in reply to his atheist interlocutor, "The moral dilema you pose, in reality, just can't happen, because God would never countenance the suffering of innocent children".
Has he read the Bible?
Obviously, with the aid of bad arguments and selective blindness, every counter argument can be refuted, misrepresented or simply ignored. I doubt anything I could possibly say would give WLC pause for thought, because, in the final analysis, man is not a rational, truth-seeking animal, but a being dominated by concrete, immediate, practical, visceral and psychological needs and desires.
I'm sorry, but I see no evidence that any "third" possibility exists regarding this question. God is, first and foremost, ultimate power, and concepts of "good" are derivative phenomena that subsequently emerge from this primordial, axiomatic fact.
Good as we understand it after creation, co-dependent on bad, would not make any sense prior to creation. If God is the only thing that exists, there is no such thing as “good,” if good is derived from God’s nature. Because there won’t be anything in existence that is derived from God’s nature. God will be the only thing that exists. Once things are created, “good” and “bad” come into existence in the sense that suddenly there are things that are “like God” and “not like God.” Everything is “bad” because nothing else is God. So everything is “not like God” in some way, at least in the sense that it isn’t God. (The Existence and Irrelevance of Gratuitous Evil in Philosophia Christia, Kirk R. MacGregor).
I realize that, if God exists his committing or commanding injustice is not self-evidently logically incoherent. It only is if you assume that God conforms to our “moral” intuitions—e.g., child abuse is wrong, only what is right is derived from God, therefore God could not command child abuse because that is wrong, and he only commands what is right and derived from him.
That could be a reason why to appeal to the Bible and revelation, because God largely transcends our human attempts to comprehend him apart from revelation. But Craig does not think God transcends these things. He believes arguments for God’s existence are very sound and logically valid. He doesn’t think God’s ineffable at all, considering everything I’ve ever read from him. He does in fact believe that God could be falsified if we can show that the concept of God is incoherent, or come up with logical rather than emotional/evidential argument against God from the problem of evil.
Dr. Craig has definitely read the Bible. There are a lot of claims about “unjust” actions on God’s part. Which one(s) do you have in mind? Some of them can be “explained away.” The only one I can think of that I would find unjust is the “binding of Isaac,” when God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. That was probably traumatizing to Isaac, kind of like child abuse. If the point of the story was to show how God condemned child sacrifice, while other nations celebrated it, then God just as easily could have told Abraham without all that trouble and trauma that child sacrifice was “wrong.” Some Christians would say that the story is allegorical of the crucifixion of Christ, when God sacrificed his “Son.” They would say that there’s no problem with Abraham being told to sacrifice Isaac since God went so far as to actually do it with Jesus of Nazareth. But, then why didn’t God say sacrificing kids is OK, since he was, technically, going to do it someday himself? There are also verses about God saying he will make the Jews eat their children because they will starve during a siege. That could be exaggerated language. It could also be blatantly cruel—like original sin, as Pascal mentioned how unjust that appears.
I would agree that we are not naturally rational and truth-seeking. But, it seems to me that some people are able to go that route and fight against their psychological needs and desires. These people actually pause for thought rather than rest in their comfortable presuppositions. A person I have in mind would be Muehlhauser, who has changed his mind several times, for example when it comes to the potential of artifical intelligence: “I didn’t use to think so, but I’ve become persuaded that unfriendly machine superintelligence is the most plausible cause of total human extinction.” http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=14936 Perhaps you could say that being truth-seeking is a psychological drive, however misguided.
For now, I see no evidence or argument that could convincingly show that God is not “ultimate power.” It all comes down to speculation and our personal preferences if we try think “rationally” about him. Why think God is constrained by logic? Why not agree with Descartes that God can make square circles? We might be able to come to some vague idea of God through reason, for example an “unmoved mover,” but that doesn’t tell us a whole lot about him. In fact, even the Bible doesn’t explicitly deny or affirm that God is power. If we can say “God is love” (1 John 4:8), why not “God is power”? It seems to depend on whether we believe God can contradict himself, contradict our perceptions of logic, contradict evidence, and get away with it! There aren’t a lot of great reasons to think God can or can’t do any of those things previously mentioned. If we decide to trust revelation, the Bible says “he cannot deny himself” (2 Tim 2:13), so God cannot contradict himsel and is therefore not ultimate power. The Bible isn’t necessarily evidence or an arguement, but it seems to me that Pascal was at least on the right track when he said, “Not only do we know God through Jesus Christ, but we only know ourselves through Jesus Christ; we only know life and death through Jesus Christ. Apart from Jesus Christ we cannot know the meaning of our life or our death, of God or of ourselves. Thus without Scripture, whose only object is Christ, we know nothing, and can see nothing but obscurity and confusion in the nature of God and in nature itself” (417).
The question would then be, Why would God make us so intellectually bankrupt and incapable of knowing him apart from revelation? Is it so some obscure tribal group can exercise greater power and control over the rest because they alone have the true “revelation” of the obscure God? So everyone has to come fawning to them to find out what this God is like? Is it because we would lean towards self-suffiency? Initially, we are in this blissful state of “perfection” in a “garden of Eden” wherein our minds are not marred by original sin and concupiscience. We become pretty sure of ourselves and aim for at least MORAL knowledge without depending on God, and so God leaves us to figure things out on our own, just like we wanted, but he curses us so our attempts to do so are pretty pathetic. Ultimately we have to turn back to him to truly know anything. That all sounds like a cruel game on God’s part, though.
I think we may have reached an impasse. It's not always been clear to me when you cite some "authority" whether you are in agreement or not? What this means is that I could end up responding to an almost infinite number of (often contradictory) arguments, plucked from the wide spectrum of Christian thought.
This possibility doesn't enthrall me because i've already spent (wasted) a large portion of my life looking for God. I have thought long and hard on these matters, over many years, and have yet to encounter a single theist argument I considered credible (morally or intellectually). My atheism is not the result of laziness, indifference or unfamiliarity with the subject. Quite the reverse . . . Consequently, I gave up "looking" for a theistic God a long time ago.
I have sympathy with some of those who seek "meaning" and "coherence" in existence and who, as a result, are interested in what religion has to say on these matters. But any modern individual who is actually impressed by religion's answers to life's existential and epistemic problems is, in my view, either in significant (spiritual) pain or in superficial denial. I have sympathy for those in the former category, but not for those in the latter.
Regarding the question of God's "injustice", I found your remark that "The only one [example] I can think of that I would find unjust is the 'binding of Isaac'" utterly incomprehensible, given that the OT in particular is filled with examples of God's arbitrary wrath.
Consequently, I put WLC into google, and after 5 minuets came across this, regarding the slaughter of the Canaanites:
I could hardly believe my eyes when I read it. It's one of the most nakedly appaling pieces of procrustean (im)moralism and sophistry i've come across in a very long time.
It's not my intention to gratuitously disparage anyone's sincerely held beliefs if those beliefs give comfort without inflicting suffering on others. Let each person choose their own path, provided others and the "common good", are not seriously jeopardised by this freedom. If you find WLC, for example, to be a credible and noteworthy contributor to these issues, then there's honestly nothing worthwhile and constructive I can add to the conversation. The gap is simply too wide.
My primary interest is in Nietzsche, and, to a lesser extent, Pascal. But my interest in, and admiration for Pascal, is largely in spite of, and certainly not because of, his religiosity (hence the thread's subtitle). Pascal, at his best, is incredibly insightful regarding many matters, he is a wonderful writer, and in possession of a quite formidable intellect. But he's also very damaged and oppressed by the darkest, most pessimistic and hopeless, fears, moods, revulsions and worries. These failings mark him out as a real flesh and blood person, in a great deal of anguish.
In utter desperation and bewilderment, he saw Jesus as the only conceivable route out of his personal abyss. I think he was wrong. Profoundly and utterly wrong. But I recognise him as a very great man nevertheless, struggling to escape from a terrifying (personal) predicament.
But, and this is the point that needs emphasising, his greatness (for me) is evident in his non-religious engagements. He was, in a very real sense, ruined (or at least made worse) by religious baggage. He sought, above all, metaphysical justification for his heartrending self-contempt, and he claimed to have found it in Christian doctrine. This self-loathing and vulnerability was the kernel of his whole belief.
But the real causes of self-loathing and vulnerability, I think, are to be found entirely in the material world, and failure to accept this fact prevents us from seeking (and hence finding) cures in the only world that really matters or exists. This world.
I will now start clarifying whether I agree with the people I quote. I do agree with Craig that “God’s own character defines what is good” and with Kirk MacGregor that evil is whatever is “not like God.” I am inclined to disagree with some of the Catholic catechism I cited. I did not actually intend for the catechism to serve as any kind of argument. Your responses to any of the arguments I cite or invent may not enthrall you, but it can serve to correct my thinking and complanceny as well as any of your blog readers’ thoughts. Maybe a lot of your ideas are the same as Nietzsche’s, and the arguments against those ideas can reveal weaknesses in Nietzsche’s ideas (although many of the arguments are themselves weak). You might encounter a new argument or learn something new. I certainly have. After reading over your comments, I have changed my mind several times and doubted Christianity. Surely your studying hasn’t been a waste.
There are a lot of examples of God’s wrath in the Bible, and some are arbitrary at first glance. I have found that examples of arbitrary wrath turn out to probably be nonarbitrary. Maybe the explanations are not conclusive beyond all doubt, but they are usually adequate. To reiterate, the only one that comes to mind that ends up eluding most adequate explanation is the binding of Isaac. I would like to find all of these examples in the Bible and reconsider my claim of their being “nonarbitrary” sometime. I assume that the slaughter of the Canaanites was an example of arbitrary wrath you had in mind.
Craig revisits the questions of the Canaanites and revises his answer somewhat, it might not strike you as repulsive as his first one:
“There is one important aspect of my answer that I would change, however. I have come to appreciate as a result of a closer reading of the biblical text that God’s command to Israel was not primarily to exterminate the Canaanites but to drive them out of the land. It was the land that was (and remains today!) paramount in the minds of these Ancient Near Eastern peoples. The Canaanite tribal kingdoms which occupied the land were to be destroyed as nation states, not as individuals. The judgment of God upon these tribal groups, which had become so incredibly debauched by that time, is that they were being divested of their land. Canaan was being given over to Israel, whom God had now brought out of Egypt. If the Canaanite tribes, seeing the armies of Israel, had simply chosen to flee, no one would have been killed at all. There was no command to pursue and hunt down the Canaanite peoples. It is therefore completely misleading to characterize God’s command to Israel as a command to commit genocide. Rather it was first and foremost a command to drive the tribes out of the land and to occupy it. Only those who remained behind were to be utterly exterminated. There may have been no non-combatants killed at all. That makes sense of why there is no record of the killing of women and children, such as I had vividly imagined. Such scenes may have never taken place, since it was the soldiers who remained to fight. It is also why there were plenty of Canaanite people around after the conquest of the land, as the biblical record attests.” http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-slaughter-of-the-canaanites-re-visited#ixzz2KGNT9rnV
I would say this is a legitimate view and agree with it as a statement of biblical “fact.”
Though you will find similar views to Craig here, I think STR states the problem of the slaughter of the Canaanites in a clearer and more rational way: http://www.str.org/site/DocServer/Enhanced_SG_January_2013.pdf?docID=6822
I do think Craig often is a “credible and noteworthy contributor.” He does a good job explaining Christian doctrines like the Trinity and Incarnation. Other times, however, he is not credible and noteworthy. I think his moral argument is not convincing; he appeals to “moral intuiton” to prove one of his premises.
I’m not sure whether to agree with you or not that Pascal’s religious beliefs worsened him. Have you read any books about Pascal by other people?
Why do you think Pascal was wrong about Jesus being “the only conceivable route our of his personal abyss”?
What do you think are the real causes of self-loathing etc. on materialism?
Let me paraphrase what Craig and yourself seem to be saying:
1. The Canaanites are alledged to be living in an "incredibly debauched" manner.
2. The Canaanites are alledged to be occupying land that, Israel claims, God has set aside for it.
3. If the Canaanites simply remove themselves from the land, none of them will be killed.
Some obvious problems with this picture:
a)How is the alledged "debauchery" of the Canaanites, who were also created by this God, to be explained? Why would the Canaanites chose "debauchery" over conformity to God's will? The short answer is that God, in his infinite wisdom and justice, chose NOT to reveal himself to the Canaanites as he did to the Jews.
So the Canaanites are essentially being punished because God chose (for some unexplained reason) NOT to reveal himself to the entire world, or even to all the people's of the region, but to his "chosen people". Why didn't God simply tell the Canaanites directly his own will?
b) The alledged "debauchery" is seen to be actually irrelevent to the slaughter. If the Canaanites leave the contested land and practise their "debauchery" somewhere else, they would all have been spared.
Again, why should the Canaanites leave the land? Is it reasonable to expect a people to abandon its land simply because an opposing external power claims it has God on its side? How is anyone to decide the veracity among competing claims about God's will and personal revelations?
This logic would justify every religiously inspired tyranny imaginable. And why stop at religion? Are Communists and Nazis, and everything in-between, not entitled to the same prerogatives?
"Our wisest sages have examined the matter closely and concluded that [insert your chosen religion/ideology] God (or Dialectical Materialism, or Social Darwinism and Race-science) wants X. Everyone is free to conform to this insight (revelation), but those who do not will be exterminated. This is the will of the Lord (or Hitler, Stalin etc), and anyone who opposes it is, ipso facto, an enemy of God and thus evil".
c)Are we to seriously believe that the children and babies of Canaan were also "incredibly debauched", or were expected to unilaterally leave the land because the priests of an opposing army said so?
d) Craig seems to entertain the possibility that, in fact, none of the "women and children" were slaughtered. Are we meant to be morally comfortable with this possibility? Are these fatherless children and husband-less wives imagined to have suffered no trauma as a result of this slaughter?
e) According to Craig, if any woman or child physically resist, then they too are to be rightfully slaughtered.
f) Even if women and children don't physically resist, but offer only passive resistance i.e. refuse to leave the land and recognise Israel's claims, then they too are to be slaughtered? Or are they to be spared death and merely consigned to the status of second class citizens?
I could go on . . . The whole thing is absurd and morally repugnant, and, at bottom, seems, in general, to rest upon a few simple axioms.
Such as:
1. Everything that appears to be irrational, illogical, inconsistent, scientifically false, and incoherent is actually allegorical, or simply the result of our own very limited human constraints and conceptualisations. God simply knows far more than the wisest of us can ever hope to, so none of our critical judgements have any lasting authority.
2. In the realm of morality, what may appear to us as injustice, cruelty, immorality, and irrational wrath on God's part, is, in fact, only so from our very limited, partial and corrupt perspective. But we must remember that man is not "the measure of things", God is; and from God's perspective, we trust, every aspect of existence is unavoidably consistent with a supremely moral God.
"No other religion has proposed we hate ourselves. No other religion therefore can please those who hate themselves and seek a being who is really worthy of love"(P.220)
"No religion except our own has taught that man is born sinful, no philosophical sect has said so, so none has told the truth" (P.421).
"Man's greatness comes from knowing he is wretched" (P.114).
"What are we to conclude from all our darkness but our unworthiness?"(P.445).
Here is a very great thinker crippled by a very explicit self-contempt. Some of this self-contempt derives from adhering to Christian value judgements regarding human nature that make little or no sense, as Pascal himself admits, outside this worldview. In addition, some of it comes from his realisation that the (natural) world doesn't conform to our desires (what Freud called the 'Reality Principle'), our desire for love, joy, knowledge, security, eternity etc.
And yet, there are very many passages in Pascal which display the most insightful and unflinching realism regarding the human condition, and which owe nothing to looking at existence through the lens of Christian value judgements. This is what Nietzsche means when he states that Pascal was ruined by Christianity. Obviously, Pascal himself didn't see it that way.
I read Reasons of the Heart by Marvin O'Connell, which was an explicitly Christian perspective. I thought it was dreadful, but can't remember any of the details now.
Briefly, I think Pascal was "wrong" because I don't believe in an afterlife where Jesus awaits him.
In many cases, it is euphemistically argued (because people fear being labelled 'elitist')that Christianity (and religion generally) isn't actually true, but it is useful to individuals and societies. I think most of the time (yes, there are exceptions) Pascal experienced his religion as deeply unsettling and painful. It certainly didn't make him "happy" in any conventional sense of that word. On the contrary, it seemed to "explain" and "justify" and make intelligible to him all his suffering and agony. In short, I think the cure is worse than the disease.
So I think he was intellectually wrong and viscerally/psychologically wrong.
Let me use a crass analogy: let's imagine i'm abused and then thoughtlessly abandoned as a child by my parents, and subsequently raised by cruel or indifferent guardians. Perhaps i'm a sensitive child and ache to be loved and protected by some authority figure. But no such authority figure comes forth to me. I am lost.
Consequently, perhaps I blame myself for the world's awful treatment of me and convince myself that I am hopelessly unworthy. In this way, masochistic as it is, I protect myself from the thought that morality plays no crucial part in existence, and I convince myself, in ways I can't quite explain, that I somehow deserve my suffering and that, if I can only purify myself of my immorality, a world of love and protection awaits me (if not here then in some indemonstrable future life).
Perhaps I spend much of my time writing letters of the starkest self-disgust and shame and guilt to my parents, taking responsibility for all my own pain and prostrate myself in all sincerity, begging their forgiveness and binding myself to their judgement, whatever it may be.
My greatest hope is that one day they may read the letters and come to accept me, depraved as I am; but, whatever happens, I am convinced that without their love and protection, no salvation or redemption is possible for me.
This, for me, is Christianity (taken seriously) in an nutshell. It's premises are wrong and so are its conclusions.
I don't deny that for some people it brings reassurance, comfort and coherence, but it purchases these things at the cost of simultaneously inflicting a vast amount of ignorance, self-righteousness and suffering onto others.
I agree with contentions 1 and 2 as you state them. I think Craig would agree with 3. I read the biblical text on the Canaanite slaughtering and found that Craig would be incorrect to agree with 3.
This is why Craig would be incorrect:
“However, they did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer, so the Canaanites have lived in the midst of Ephraim to this day but have been made to do forced labor” (Joshua 16:10).
So, the Canaanites could remain without being killed, they just had to do forced labor. Those who did fight back were in all likelihood killed. But, this was NOT the original intent of the “commandment.” If the Israelites actually obeyed their God, then everybody who dared to remain would be killed. There would be no chance of forced labor. They had to be driven out or killed. The reason for this was “ ‘that they may not teach you [Israelites] to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the Lord your God’ ” (Deuteronomy 20:18). God’s intent for the Israelites was that they be the “good” nation who helped guide other nations to conform to God’s will. They needed to be separate to avoid assimilating to the other nation’s ways. Of course, one wonders why God could not just make the Israelites live somewhere far away from all of the evil nations rather than go around driving the evil nations far away from them. Especially since, as you point out, the evil nations just keep doing evil in other places. Anyone could conjecture that God “needed” the Israelites to be in that one spot for some reason, or else history could have unfolded completely differently. It could have, but I don’t see how that “justifies” (humanly speaking) the complex decision to drive out or slay all preoccupants of the land. Part of the “punishment” of these wicked inhabitants was the very fact they were driven out, apparently, but that doesn’t make much of an impact on their overall practice of evil as far as we know. It might give them so momentary discomfort. As you imply in the two axioms, we can hardly guess what particular reason an incomprehensible being outside of space and time would have for any of his actions unless he told us himself. And, speaking in a purely rational and basic sense, if we say there is any sort of self-evident, legitimate justification for the Israelites driving people away because God said so, that means there is such justification for the acts of Hitler etc.—I could argue that because the Canaanites were so corrupt that makes a difference, but if, as you say, the corruption just got pushed around on the map rather than extinguished, it is a distinction without a difference.
Canaanite widows and fatherless children might be upset by the loss of their fathers and husbands (considering the Canaanite culture, I’m not sure about that). But, whether we go the route that they live or die, either way we have some complaints. So, Craig’s bringing up the possibilty they aren’t killed doesn’t add to his response.
Now, what would a baby know of these abominable practices? Nothing, I suspect. The killing of Canaanite babies would be stupid and pointless. Older children might know something of the abominable practices, but they could probably be disciplined out of them easily, and as impressionable kids they might readily conform to the Israelite society and drop all of their old ways. Or they could hold grudges against the people who drove their families away and killed their fathers. Anyway, I think the Canaanite children’s parents would want them to accompany them as they are driven out of the land. We can suppose that the Israelites warned the Canaanites that they would kill them if they tried to resist, and any Canaanite family would flee to save their children. But, considering that the Canaanites would sacrifice their children to the god Molech, the desire to protect their children from the Israelites could have been nonexistent.
The failure to drive out or kill the Canaanites supposedly had terribly consequences for the Israelites and their mission as the “light to the world”:
“’ [God speaking]But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then those of them whom you let remain shall be as barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall trouble you in the land where you dwell. And I will do to you as I thought to do to them’” (Numbers 33:55-6). Since neither of these exactly happened, the passive-obedient Canaanites who stayed behind in society helped open cracks in it so that Israel began assimilating to the Canaanite ways (of course this would not have been the only principle leading to debauchery in Israel).
The fate God originally allotted the Canaanites was the same fate allotted Israel when it “followed Canaan’s footsteps” in the path of “incredible debauchery.” Israel/Judah (since Israel was divided into two kingdoms at the time of the exile) was driven out of the land, and everyone who tried to stay behind was killed.
“ ‘Because you have said, “The Lord has raised up prophets for us in Babylon,” thus says the Lord concerning the king who sits on the throne of David, and concerning all the people who dwell in this city, your kinsmen who did not go out with you into exile: “Thus says the Lord of hosts, behold, I am sending on them sword, famine, and pestilence, and I will make them like vile figs that are so rotten they cannot be eaten. I will pursue them with sword, famine, and pestilence, and will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a curse, a terror, a hissing, and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them, because they did not pay attention to my words, declares the Lord, that I persistently sent to you by my servants the prophets, but you would not listen, declares the Lord” ’ ” (Jeremiah 29:15-19).
Notice how Israel/Judah, even after having received God’s “revelation,” from miracles to a Law, went the way of incredible debauchery—the same state Canaan was supposedly in when Israel went and “drove” the Canaanites away. So, having God reveal his will to a nation does not necessarily mean it will conform to that will. Even repeatedly telling his will to a nation, while it is in a state of debauchery at least, does not help things (as seen with their refusal to heed the prophets).
There is also the claim that all the stories we find in at least the first five books of the Bible were invented, so that probably no “Slaughtering of the Canaanites” ever happened. Even so, the moral problem that comes from it doesn’t disappear but can just be shifted to other atrocities like the Holocaust (which was undoubtedly worse than any Canaanite slaughtering).
Your axioms, I think, are indeed what is behind a lot of Christian and Jewish rationalizing the Bible etc. From a “godless” perspective, these axioms strike me as comical, sad, and the desperate attempts of religious people to keep their unconscious (or subconscious) fears and doubts and “cognitive dissonance” from every reaching the surface. As a Christian, I do not consciously try to stifle my uncertainties etc. by postulating those two axioms. I do believe and agree with them, but as far as I know, with an innocent sincerity that is oblivious to any unconscious motives. They make sense to me (for now), and seem the natural inference from the existence of God and the relationship between God and man. These axioms seem to fit in anywhere: On atheism, they reveal how psychologically twisted we are. On theism, they show how “great” God is and how feeble we humans are.
For some time now you have been referring to “morality,” and I would like to ask what you mean by it? Do you actually believe there is morality? If so, where does it come from?
There is nothing at all transcendent about "Morality", but it certainly exists, and is as real as tables and chairs.
It (and thus conscience, which is a form of morality) is a completely natural phenomenon which, put simply, denotes our (contingent) preferences and aversions.
Morality is necessary because in very many instances, neutrality and indifference is not a desirable option. We are moral beings because we need to discriminate between various thoughts, actions, and feelings in contingent environmental circumstances.
Our preferences and aversions are symptoms of our organism's perceived (usually unconsciously) conditions of preservation and growth (loosely defined).
It has many sources, such as: physiology, evolutionary history, socialisation, historical contingency, existing power-relations, psychological predisposition, and an assessment (usually unconscious) of our enviornment (physical and social) in relation to our goals, needs, desires etc.
Admittedly, all this is rather vague and general, and doesn't begin to do justice to the enormous complexity involved in some of our relations with "morality". Nevertheless, the most important thing is that it is a wholly natural phenomenon, regardless of the complexity that may (or may not) be involved.
Almost no one, i've long since discovered, likes this idea, and it's easy to understand why this should be so. However, i'm aware of no persuasive argument or evidence which refutes it.
I don't know any persuasive argument or evidence to refute your definition of morality either. In fact, it makes more sense than theistic-based morality. Have you heard of desirism/desire utilitarianism? Its main proponent is Alonzo Fyfe. His blog is http://atheistethicist.blogspot.com/ if you'd like to find out more.
What follows is my response to your post on Pascal and why you think he's wrong in selecting Christianity as a "cure."
I see that you and Nietzsche mean by "Pascal was ruined by Christianity" that he was consumed by self-contempt. It isn't clear to me how self-contempt ruined him, though. Do you mean that his self-contempt reassured him that mankind has no ability to escape his "unworthiness" except through Christ, so that all other legitimate exits are ignored?
I can identify with Pascal and the analogy you give of Christianity, in experiencing it as "deeply unsettling and painful." But, I don't think that your analogy is completely accurate.
Here is the portion of it I disagree with (possibly because I do not understand the analogy, and hopefully you will correct any misinterpretation):
"I somehow deserve my suffering and that, if I can only purify myself of my immorality, a world of love and protection awaits me (if not here then in some indemonstrable future life)."
Christianity does teach that some people deserve the suffering dealt them, but not all suffering is "deserved." The suffering of Christ (and Catholicism teaches Mary's suffering as well) is not deserved. Much of the suffering Christians are supposed to experience is not punishment alone as it is the means of "purification."
Christianity does teach that we must be "purified of immorality" in order to attain the so-called "beatific vision" of God. But, all of this purifying is done by God (we must co-operate, however). Since we generally fail to become purified in this life, Catholicism (at least this one among the many denominations) teaches the doctrine of purgatory, where Christians who die as imperfect people go to be "perfected" in order to "enter" heaven. The purifying is not entirely in our own hands, otherwise we would be helpless.
I could be a hypocrite here, demanding evidence and arguments against Christianity when any I offer for it would probably be unconvincing and weak (as they seem to be until someone shows otherwise). But, do you have a reason why Christianity is probably false because of its visceral and psychological effects? Or any argument/evidence in general against it?
It seems to me that the self-righteousness that can result from Christianity does not result because of the religion itself but because of the misunderstanding of the people who follow it: Jesus threatens that self-righteous people deserve to go to hell (Mat. 23:33).
What do you mean, specifically, by the "suffering" and "ignorance" caused by Christianity?
I don't know if you saw this earlier question, but what do you think are the real causes of self-loathing etc. on materialism?
No, i've never heard of "desire utilitarianism", nor Alonzo Fyfe. I'll try and have a look later when I have time . . .
Nietzsche, being an unrepentant and explicit elitist, first of all recognises Pascal's genius as a thinker who had already excelled in many fields and who is also (at times) capable of taking an unsentimental and realistic view of humanity.
i.e. I'm referring to all those insights and achievements of Pascal that have nothing at all to do with his Christianity. These achievements and abilities show him to be a very great thinker.
Now, enter his commitment to Christianity and what do we find? We find that virtually all of his scientific and mathematical energies are now closed down. Even in the realm of investigating and evaluating the human animal we find a strange juxtaposition: we find numerous passages in Pensées where Pascal displays a thoroughly cool, courageous, unsentimental and realistic perspective on humanity and society, one every bit as "realistic" as thinkers such as Thucydides, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Gibbon etc.
And yet, alongside these explicitly realistic and unsentimental perspectives there is a huge amount of text devoted to affirming Christian texts and value judgements that are anything but cool, unsentimental and realistic.
Pascal is severely tormented by various kinds of "existential" anxieties and wounds, and, by a leap of faith, places all his hopes in Jesus as his only possible redeemer. In the final analysis, he is aware that he has no solid and coherent arguments or evidence in support of this commitment, but he feels that without this leap of faith he is utterly lost. I can imagine him trembling or in tears as he writes many passages.
So Yes, I think that:
a) his commitment to Christ didn't result in any psychological equilibrium and peace for him (regardles of whether Jesus awaited him or not).
And b) his commitment was so strong that he shut the doors to any other potential (i.e. natural, non-theological) appraisal and subsequent escape from his condition.
(Newton, for example, another towering intellect, although very differently constituted than Pascal, spent a great deal of time on theological issues (and alchemy) that, to many of us today, seem utterly pointless).
I've just accidentally erased a long post I was just about to send, so please forgive me for the brevity of this one?
Let's look at the question of "egoism". This is one of the reasons why Pascal thinks humanity (all humanity) is corrupt.
Pascal sees the common man and the saint as being both prompted by egoistic desires. He thinks (correctly, I think) that none of our thoughts, feelings and actions take place without a component of "egoism" being involved.
This he thinks (correctly, I believe), applies to every single human being, regardless of how philanthropic, benevolent and self-sacrificial things may appear (even to the subject's own consciousness).
So far, these are descriptive claims about the way things actually are. Now comes the moralism of Christianity.
Even our alleged "virtues", Pascal believes, are contaminated by sin, by the inevitability of self-love. Even our virtues are forms of corruption!
Pascal is deeply repulsed and horrified by this inevitability. He hates and despises this aspect of our nature and sees it as a mark of our intrinsic "corruption".
Nietzsche, however, responds that this way of interpreting existence is utter madness! What Pascal is showing, though he is loathe to see it, is that our "egoism" is part of our innocence. Only by comparing and contrasting ourselves to a fictitious and utterly impossible model of "goodness" and "moral perfection" does this self-denigration of humanity make any sense.
This commitment to the utterly indemonstrable and inaccessible world of alledged transcendence necessitates that everything natural and worldly is viewed with the deepest suspicion or hostility.
Of course, Pascal knows this, intellectually speaking:
"Christianity is strange; it bids man to recognise that he is vile, and even abominable, and bids him want to be like God" (P.351).
Put simply, if the possibility of a fully non-egoistic act is deemed an impossibility (as Pascal and Nietzsche agree that it is) then that is no reason to hate ourselves, rather, it is reason for us to recognise that the traditional conceptual moral opposites we have been affirming need to be abandoned.
If the non-egoistic simply cannot exist in humanity then the "egoistic" can no longer mean what it previously meant when it was deemed to have a polar opposite. i.e. There is no justification (outside allegiance to Christian metaphysics) to adopt a principled objection to and condemnation of, humanity.
There remain, of course, forms and expressions of "egoism" that we deplore and oppose, in ourselves and others, but we oppose and deplore these things without positing the impossibility of a genuinely selfless action.
In simple language, we should accept our embodied "selfishness" and seek more sublimated, mutually advantageous, and prudent expressions of it, and spend no more time condemning what we are, and must necessarily be, in favour of a form of being that we have never (and will never) encountered.
As Nietzsche says, in a rare bit of humour about a deadly serious subject "We no longer admire dentists who pull out the teeth to stop them hurting".
You are right to point out that some features of my earlier analogy are not strictly applicable to orthodoxy. However it is the nature of all analogies that, at some point, they break down. It is sufficient, for my present purposes, that very many instances of suffering are either undeserved or disproportionately severe. The fact that there may be exceptions to this general picture doesn't alter the general validity, in my view.
Since none of us, even the most "sinful", chose to be born in the first place, and thus inherit (unavoidably) the consequences of an original sin which we played no part in committing, i'd say that that already makes our "corruption" and "sinfulness" a matter of theological semantics.
Forgive me continually coming back to first principles, but, if I were God and I created a fish (for example), it seems simply incomprehensible to me that they should be condemned and feel ashamed because they can't fly like a bird. Given that I have created them anatomically incapable of flight, and they can see that fact for themselves, why should anyone expect to be "redeemed" and "purified" of their "fish-like" nature? If I (as God) wanted birds, why would I create fish? Why does God create humans and then reject them for being as he made them?
I only ask this rhetorically, the whole enterprise defies sense (for me) . . .
I am not vehemently opposed to Christianity (and certainly not Christians, qua people) although I think it obviously false, for several reasons:
1. In my country (UK), at this particular historical time, there are relatively few toxic manifestations of Christianity, compared to other sources of social ills.
2. Some of the people I love and respect most have been (are) Christians.
3. I think that reality and "truth" is, for the most part, rather ugly, and very difficult, in many instances, to accept and digest fully. Illusions are sometimes necessary and useful in the service of life.
4. Many atheists congratulate themselves on rejecting theism as beneath their intellect, only to rush seamlessly into various non-religious forms of stupidity, superficiality and humbug without a hint of irony or shame.
Nevertheless, I do see it as obviously false and entirely the work of human hands. While it has brought comfort and coherence to many it has also inflicted tremendous suffering and ignorance on those who got in its way.
I think monotheism is the single worst idea that humanity has ever embraced. Religion is a shield, but it is also a sword, and has been used, on countless occasions, to murder, terrify and silence those who (actively or passively) opposed its will.
No doubt, here is where one frequently encounters the "No True Scotsman" fallacy put forward by many, who will claim that none of my criticisms actually apply to it (the true spirit of religion) but only to those who misunderstood religion or who cynically used it as a pretext for their entirely non-religious agendas.
Having read the Bible, I find none of these arguments convincing.
re: "the real causes of Pascal's self-loathing" being entirely in the material world.
I certainly don't mean anything cryptic or arcane by this statement. I mean simply that there is no invisible, transcendent, purposeful, moral force, acting on the world.
Human psychology is bewilderingly complex and we are still well short of having an adequate account of it. Nevertheless, our lack of omniscience in this area doesn't imply total ignorance of the most likely causal factors involved.
So, using the very broadest brush strokes, we know that everything is dependent upon, and rests upon, the interaction between our individual genetic configuration and the enviornment in which we find ourselves. We know that, statistically speaking, childhood casts a long shadow into adulthood in shaping our character, especially if trauma has occurred. We know that we are fundamentally social animals, as Aristotle long ago observed, and that our sense of self worth is often related to how we are perceived and treated by those around us.
We know that we are essentially erotic animals, and that erotic impulses are often sublimated and disguised in other nominally non-erotic behaviours. We know that most of us strive for distinction, in one form of other, and that we seek the protection, respect and love of significant others. We also know that we can be profoundly wounded and hurt by the actions of others. Schopenhauer's porcupines comes to mind here -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedgehog's_dilemma
In short, there are a thousand reasons why we may come to despise ourselves. Most of us have outgrown the need to invoke animism, or witchcraft, or demonic possession, or astrology, or Karma, or failure to appease the God Apollo (to take some crass examples), in order to account for our suffering and misfortunes, and we have done this, to a very large degree because we see that the universe (and the material in it) appears to operate according to the concept of (natural) cause and effect, according to the laws of physics etc (Quantum Theory doesn't help theists here).
Given this increasing naturalistic tendency in the modern world, it seems entirely likely that Pascal's self-loathing came into existence as the result of these completely naturalistic forces (however complex they may be).
Of course, the deist can claim (invoking the increasingly familiar God-of-the-gaps tactic)that God created the laws of physics in the first place, but that's an entirely different subject . . .
I will keep this (probably correct) interpretation of Pascal in mind when I read the Pensées. Thank you for taking the time to rewrite your deleted post.
Why did we humans invent a realm of “moral perfection” if such a concept is so contrary to everything we know? Why did we set an insane standard for “goodness” we are incapable of attaining? Would you say it is because therefore “everything natural and worldly is viewed with the deepest suspicion or hostility,” and that aids in evolutionary development?
Where does Nietzsche talk about egoism and his interpretation of it?
You already know about original sin, and I could combat your fish analogy by saying that the fish actually used to know how to fly (as the fish-God made him capable of flight), but he decided to swim instead (preferring to “recreate himself” independent of the fish-God’s design) and so he adapted to the water and all of his fish children are born to swim. His new, swimmy nature was passed on to his kids, as traducianism teaches. His kids never knew how to fly, though they had a vague idea of it by looking at the birds. They also could never hope to fly unless the fish God redeemed them from their plight (by becoming a fish that can fly and swim). One problem with this is that, if the flying fish can make himself a swimming fish, why can’t he make himself a flying fish again? Why need the fish-God’s help? And why did the fish-God make the water pond to begin with? Why make swimming a possibility, to heap shame and contempt on the heads of all future fish for their watery prison? It was their dad’s fault. All of this probably only reaffirms how sense-defying original sin is.
I agree with you (after some discussion we already had about the Canaanites) that the Old Testament has many stories involving religious-inflicted suffering. But, the New Testament does not advocate stoning unbelievers, sinners, or spreading Christianity through violence (although some cited Luke 14:23 to justify Christianity-inspired violence). Your criticisms to apply to teaching in the Old Testament, but they don’t apply as far as I can see to the New Testament.
What do you mean when you say quantum theory doesn’t help theists? Have you heard of Alvin Plantinga and his book Where the Conflict Really Lies? Chapters 3 and 4 deal with “divine intervention” and quantum mechanics. I’ll read them soon in case you’d like to know what he has to say (unless you already know).
I now understand what you mean by self-loathing etc. having legitimate causes in a purely material world. I see no reason for now why the theistic explanation of self-loathing as original sin would be better than the naturalistic explanation of self-loathing.
What do you think about Pascal’s observation of how we humans are obsessed with “diversion”? Do you agree with him (supposing I understand what he means by it) that the reason for this is to avoid confronting reality?—nevermind that you both have different views of reality. Did Nietzsche ever address this tendency to “divert” ourselves?
I don't have time now to deal with all of your points.
1. Regarding morality, goodness, nihilism, egoism and the natural world from Nietzsche's perspective - may I suggest you look at the thread on this blog titled Nietzsche, Nihilism and Sensitivity. It's not that long and it'll give you a basically accurate and substantive summary of a certain Nietzschean perspective on things. There are, in my view, some extremely profound and insightful remarks here, but it makes difficult reading, for obvious reasons . . .
2. Fish and Birds. I hear what you're saying, but then the original "fish", being able to fly, weren't really "fish" at all.
3. I see Jesus as being essentially out of place in the Bible. I don't think he belongs there (so to speak). But regardless, I certainly see Jesus as very explicitly advocating pacifism in all our social interactions. i.e. I see the whole "Just War" theology, no matter how conditional and circumspect, as bogus. So yes, my common criticisms of the OT don't apply to Jesus in the Gospels. The texts in the NT that come after the Gospels, however, don't impress me at all morally, but, it's been a very long time since I read them, so i'm not up to speed with many of the details.
4. Quantum Theory: I've heard of Plantinga but never read him. I've seen a couple of videos of him and, well, it's not for me . . .
Quantum Theory sometimes surfaces in various forms of contemporary woo as some sort of loophole out of determinism. This loophole is always sought in the interests of morality and human dignity, but it's a dead end, as far as I can see, because at the levels that really matter to us, as functioning, living beings, Newtonian physics applies.
Nietzsche:"Men were thought of as 'free' so that they could become guilty".
None of our conscious decisions are made at the quantum level, so the indeterminacy that seems to apply there simply isn't relevant to theology (i.e. morality). The "freedom" that apparently pertains at that microscopic level vanishes at higher levels, which is where all morally significant actions take place.
Without the concept of guilt, the whole structure collapses. But guilt requires freedom, and since freedom is hard to reconcile with our deterministic account of Nature, Quantum Theory is embraced as a get-out-of-jail cared (actually, a get-back-into-jail card, i.e. responsibility=freedom=guilt), but it should be apparent that subatomic "randomness" and "indeterminacy" are not moral phenomena and neither are they operative at the level of conscious deliberation.
I find the question of "diversion" fascinating and very important. I'll try and respond tomorrow.
Nietzsche notes this view of Pascal and basically agrees with it, as do I. A large part of Nietzsche's descriptive (as opposed to normative) project is concerned with our love of error, lies, semblance, superficiality, etc. So much so that for Nietzsche the essence of human existence is essentially its superficiality.
We are predisposed to error, physiologically and psychologically speaking, due to the utility that's often involved in interpreting the world (and ourselves) falsely. This perspective, naturally enough, raises interesting, and perhaps disturbing and belittling, questions regarding the will to truth and the quest for facts, for certainty, for genuine knowledge etc.
These questions are often at the forefront of Nietzsche's mind, and he continually vacillates between seeing the (necessarily ascetic) truth-seeking thinker as a glorious exception among humanity, and, on the other hand, as a symptom of decadence and failure.
"Why did a standard of 'goodness' we are constitutionally incapable of attaining prevail"?
This is a difficult and complex question which is at the very core of Nietzsche's work, but precisely because it is difficult and complex subject it would, perhaps, be wise of me to say nothing at all rather than offer anything here that must necessarily be simplified and incomplete. On the other hand, I don't want to avoid difficult and complex questions for overly purist reasons, and so, on balance, I think it's best to run the risk of saying something stupid and crude rather than saying nothing at all.
What follows, therefore, is just a few preliminary, provisional and simplified remarks.
1. Christianity is premised on the concept of human unworthiness, sin and guilt, and the desire for and the inability of personally acquired redemption.
2. Unworthiness, guilt, sin, and related matters, became dogma in Judaism after the Babylonian and Assyrian enslavements. Rather than abandon a God who seemed to have abandoned his 'chosen people' the Jews chose to explain their failure and humiliation as a failure, not of their God, but of their people, and their lack of strict obedience to God's will.
3. In such a setting, the warrior caste has been obliterated and a distinctly priestly caste is the directing force of the people. This priestly caste, in such dire material conditions, comes increasingly to associate worldly sucess and happiness with depravity, with the gentiles, the unbelievers. This theology is predisposed to disparage the world in favour of transcendence and the concept of a glorious after-life for the pious.
4. Nietzsche sees this whole outlook as an expression of ressentiment (he always uses the French word). Put simply, rather than admit failure, we reinterpret our worldly failure as a moral merit, as a sign of our superiority over those we envy and hate. We define ourselves as being unlike those we oppose, our whole outlook is premised on negation of the earth and worldly success, happiness and appetites. In a word, we accomplish spiritual revenge on those we despise who have power over us.
5. In the figure of Jesus, unworldliness and disdain for worldly sucess reaches an apex. However it is important to note that, for Nietzsche, Jesus himself was, in all likelihood, completely free of ressentiment.
But the world misunderstands Jesus, fails to follow his example, but utilises him for its own ends. The preference for the lowly, the despised, oppressed, marginalised, the mediocre, etc, is attractive to the masses, as is the aversion to the rich, powerful, happy, learned, etc. Again, this is spiritual revenge, as compensatory satisfaction for actual worldly failure.
6. Once a critical mass of the population is seduced by this ideology it thereby offers the ambitious, the powerful, the leaders within a population, opportunities for influence and control. The "moral ideal" of selflessness, ironically enough, is often promoted most successfully by those who seek power and influence. Eventually, even Kings and Emperors solemnly proclaim and defend this ideal, because (nominally) promoting the ideal has become an instrument for power and legitimacy.
7. While most people are little troubled by the historical, theological, epistemological, moral and dialectical questions involved in this issue, and operate primarily on practical grounds, a small minority of more sensitive, serious and intelligent souls take this moral ideal to their hearts and struggle with it (intellectually and practically). Pascal is an example of this sincere and troubled type. But, to repeat, these types are very rare within the general population.
Again, everything i've said here is a very simplified and incomplete summary of things, and should not be taken too literally or seriously.
We find ourselves in a world not of our choosing, frequently unable to bend actuality to our will and desire. The pain, anguish and frustration that arises from this primordial fact often motivates us to disparage actuality in favour of some ideal or other.
Plato, for example, and much subsequent philosophy, takes pride on its devaluation of the testimony of the senses, while modern science has a much less hostile (though still sceptical) view of the testimony of the sense. It is clear, to me at least, which method is preferable in the pursuit of knowledge. But Plato's hostility to actuality is only one instance of this anti-naturalness, which is, in one form or another, very common in humanity.
Orthodox epistemology, in other words, mirrors our general hostility towards the actual in favour of some unobtainable paradigm, so that for Kant, for example, all of our knowledge only relates to the phenomenal world, while the noumenal world and the 'thing-in-itself' is, for him, forever beyond our reach.
In Nietzschean language, we wish to escape the flux of Becoming and dwell in the womb of Being.
As a Christian you won't like or believe any of this, but, given the subject matter and my interest in Nietzsche, I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge his take on this question.
In order to get a fuller account of Nietzsche's view of these matters The Anti-Christ and the Genealogy, at the very least, would need to be read. The Anti-Christ, in particular, contains Nietzsche's most sustained speculation on the nature of Jesus (as the extremity of a certain type of person), and his relation to the external world in general and Christianity in particular.
However, in Beyond Good and Evil Nietzsche writes the following:
"[Woman] - clairvoyant in the world of suffering and, unfortunately, also desirous far beyond her strength to help and save . . . Woman would like to believe that love can achieve anything . . . Alas, whoever knows the heart will guess how poor, stupid, helpless, arrogant, blundering, more apt to destroy than to save is even the best and profoundest love! It is possible that underneath the holy fable and disguise of Jesus' life there lies concealed one of the most painful cases of the martyrdom of knowledge about love: the martyrdom of the most innocent and desirous heart, never sated by any human love; demanding love, to be loved and nothing else . . .; the story of a poor fellow, unsated and insatiable in love, who had to invent hell in order to send to it those who did not want to love him - and who finally, having gained knowledge about human love, had to invent a god who is all love, all ability to love - who has mercy on human love because it is so utterly wretched and unknowing. Anyone who feels that way, who knows this about love - seeks death. But why reflect on such painful things? As long as one does not have to". (BGE.269).
This treats the image of a limitlessly loving God, not as something supported by reason and evidence, but as an entirely visceral and psychological desire. And this desire, this wish and longing for such a being, is rooted in dissatisfaction with actuality, as an escape from the often grubby, tragic and woefully inadequate manifestations of even the best that merely human love has to offer.
Of course, this is a portrait of Jesus that no believer can accept, and, furthermore, it is simply speculation on Nietzsche's part. Nevertheless, it has two important and credible features, in my view; firstly, it implicitly bypasses any theological attempts to justify and defend the notion of a loving God as a genuine possibility as simply not worthy of discussion; and secondly, it offers a motivational theory as origin, that is psychologically credible and consistent with what we already know about human beings; namely, that we often believe in that which we most desire.
1. I’ll check out that blog post you mention soon.
2. You’re on the right track, but it’s the fish who can’t fly that isn’t a fish. It’s “fallen, corrupt” man who is not entirely human. Christianity is about making us “human,” with Jesus as the model for a true human.
3. Jesus may not be a total advocate for peace since he says, “’Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword’” (Mat. 10:34). I doubt he means literal violence and war. Based on the context of the verse (division in the family), he might mean ideological division—which, as we can see, is going on in our conversations. There is also the episode where “Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons” (Mat. 21:12). Overall, though, he certainly wanted his followers to be peaceful people (even if he was not an entirely peaceful character).
4. Plantinga deals with miracles and quantum theory, and I thought you might be thinking about miracles when you said it doesn’t help theists. Since you weren’t, Plantinga probably won’t add to the conversation.There are even interpretations of quantum theory that make it out to be deterministic, so invoking it to bring in free will is unhelpful. I haven’t seriously studied determinism/free will or their corresponding arguments, so until I do all I can say is that I agree that with determinism, the concept of guilt is pointless. Do you have a blog post on here or do you know the specific writings by Nietzsche where he deals with determinism and free will?
Could you explain why, at least to Nietzsche, the truth-seeking thinker is “a symptom of decadence and failure”?
Where or in which of Nietzsche’s works does he deal with the problem of why “a standard of 'goodness' we are constitutionally incapable of attaining prevail"?
Does Nietzsche anywhere explain why we humans, of all the animals (so it seems), “wish to escape the flux of Becoming and dwell in the womb of Being”? Do you mind explaining what that means in non-Nietzschan language?
I understand the idea of God as a fulfillment of a psychological desire, but that interpretation of Jesus by Nietzsche is confusing, especially the phrase “Anyone who feels that way, who knows this about love - seeks death.” I don’t get what he’s saying. Could you please explain what he means? Obviously, I disagree with this description of Jesus. Most of all I find it contrived—but, if we have to explain Jesus as a mere human in a godless universe, Nietzsche’s view might work.
You also say a credible feature of Nietzsche’s method here is how he “bypasses any theological attempts to justify and defend the notion of a loving God as a genuine possibility as simply not worthy of discussion.” That sounds like an a priori rejection of made without thinking things over (however, his reasons for “a priori” rejecting the possibility of a loving God might be elsewhere—brutality of the natural world etc.).
Your questions here regarding Nietzsche are important, and they are certainly issues he explores in most of his work. However, it would require several very lengthy posts in order for me to even begin to do justice to his views on these matters.
May I again suggest you have a look at the short Nietzsche, Nihilism and Sensitivity thread? This won't answer all of your questions, but it'll serve as a good staring point. After reading that, feel free to ask any related question you like.
Free will?
Nietzsche denies free will. Are you thinking of determinism and free will purely with regards to morality, or are you posing the question also as a matter of "detached" philosophical/scientific interest?
If you're looking for a piece of Nietzsche text on the subject, see the chapter 'The Four Great Errors' in Twilight of the Idols.
For Nietzsche and Jesus: see The Anti-Christ 24-36. I must warn you that some of Nietzsche's language here will be very offensive to most Christians.
The BGE quotation above: what, exactly, do you find confusing?
What Jesus most wants/needs, he can't find in actuality, so that death offers two possibilities to anyone suffering in this way, one positive, the other negative:(i)the negative attraction is simply a release and escape from the pain of being alive into nothingness; (ii) the positive attraction is to escape the pain of being alive by actively seeking death, in order to dwell in a hoped-for world of bliss.
A loving God?
This is really the "problem of evil" in different language. There are certainly a priori reasons for rejecting such a notion, the co-dependency of the concepts of good and evil being the principal one, but this is overwhelmingly an empirical claim. The one thing we can all agree on is the ubiquity of suffering, on an unimaginable scale, not only among humanity, but throughout the animal kingdom.
It would be more credible, but equally wrong, to interpret existence as evidently the work of some wicked God, or simply an amoral, aesthetic God; both of these conceptions track more faithfully the world as we actually know it than the notion of a loving God, which doesn't track actuality at all!
But neither a wicked nor an amoral, aesthetic God, (to say nothing of a non-existent God)edifies us moderns, and so, in a Leibniz-like fashion, we entertain every avenue of thought that will render the world digestible to us.
In no other knowledge-seeking discipline I can think of does this strategy operate; in no other academic realm do we routinely disparage the evidence of the senses in favour of an indemonstrable, unfalsifiable, and untestable hypothesis. Here we don't really want the truth; here we want edification, meaning, purpose, dignity, power, consolation, comfort, happiness, and if the universe won't naturally grant us these things, we can always interpret the universe so that it appears to.
My views on Jesus?
My views are similar to those of Nietzsche in The Anti-Christ, 28-36. I have no way of knowing, what, if anything, actually occurred, but i'm prepared to provisionally believe that an extraordinarily courageous, dignified, and loving man found himself among a community of largely ignorant, bigoted and violent fools. My guess is that a few people were greatly impressed by him and others were simply fascinated, bewildered and mesmerised by his example. I see him almost entirely as a "man of action", a man defined by his deeds, and not as a "thinker".
I think Nietzsche's speculation on the character of Jesus (see esp. The Anti-Christ, 28-26) is broadly credible, as a psychological and physiological possibility, but that's not to say that I think it's actually true. I don't think there's any way of determining the truth here, all we can do is speculate.
The Anti-Christ has some great things in it, and it's his most sustained assault on Christianity. However, it also contains some very regrettable features. Nietzsche is not a systematic or consistent thinker, and frequently the brilliant and good is mixed up with the stupid and bad. A lot of unpicking is required if he is to be used wisely.
Great though the Anti-Christ is, it's often shrill and untidy. Daybreak, in my view, is a superior work and the place where anyone new to Nietzsche should start. Of all Nietzsche's works Daybreak and Beyond Good and Evil are probably my favourites.
Actually, probably the best place to start would be Michael Tanner's Nietzsche. It's a little book, but far superior to most.
If, after that, you want to read Nietzsche himself, Daybreak or The Gay Science would be a good place to start. Translations by Kaufmann or Hollingdale are fine.
“There is something self-evidently ludicrous about us puny little humans thinking we can know God's nature through a priori methods. It's no small matter that Pascal often refers to Him as ‘The Hidden God’”. Well, here is the Catholic catechism’s ideas about the matter. Maybe it can clarify our ideas about God and human thinking. III. Coming to knowledge of God http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PB.HTM 37 In the historical conditions in which he finds himself, however, man experiences many difficulties in coming to know God by the light of reason alone: Though human reason is, strictly speaking, truly capable by its own natural power and light of attaining to a true and certain knowledge of the one personal God, who watches over and controls the world by his providence, and of the natural law written in our hearts by the Creator; yet there are many obstacles which prevent reason from the effective and fruitful use of this inborn faculty. For the truths that concern the relations between God and man wholly transcend the visible order of things, and, if they are translated into human action and influence it, they call for self-surrender and abnegation. the human mind, in its turn, is hampered in the attaining of such truths, not only by the impact of the senses and the imagination, but also by disordered appetites which are the consequences of original sin. So it happens that men in such matters easily persuade themselves that what they would not like to be true is false or at least doubtful.13 38 This is why man stands in need of being enlightened by God's revelation, not only about those things that exceed his understanding, but also "about those religious and moral truths which of themselves are not beyond the grasp of human reason, so that even in the present condition of the human race, they can be known by all men with ease, with firm certainty and with no admixture of error".14
So, as Pascal says, a good deal of God would be quite hidden without “revelation” if there is such a thing. A good deal is hidden even with it.
This portion, “How can we speak about God,” you might find interesting: IV. How Can We Speak about God? http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PC.HTM 40 Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking. 41 All creatures bear a certain resemblance to God, most especially man, created in the image and likeness of God. the manifold perfections of creatures - their truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God. Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures’ perfections as our starting point, "for from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their Creator".15 42 God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language of everything in it that is limited, imagebound or imperfect, if we are not to confuse our image of God --"the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the invisible, the ungraspable"-- with our human representations.16 Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God. 43 Admittedly, in speaking about God like this, our language is using human modes of expression; nevertheless it really does attain to God himself, though unable to express him in his infinite simplicity. Likewise, we must recall that "between Creator and creature no similitude can be expressed without implying an even greater dissimilitude";17 and that "concerning God, we cannot grasp what he is, but only what he is not, and how other beings stand in relation to him.”
Given the amount of material and the actual details of the content you're offering me here, it seems reasonable for me to assume that you find this material impressive, if not conclusive. I'm afraid I can't concur. The whole thing is, I suspect, deliberately incoherent and contradictory.
I'll just stick to a few points:
1. It begins with the demonstrably false claim that, via reason alone, it is possible to acquire "true and certain knowledge" of a monotheistic, interventionist God.
2. It uses the concept of "original sin" as an explanation of aspects of human nature that it doesn't like. This reminds me of the Marxist concept of "false consciousness" (a concept which has its roots in monotheistic dogma and authority), whereby any serious criticism of Marxism is simply dismissed as the product of an enlightened and reactionary consciousness.
In plain language - "those who disagree or oppose our understanding of revelation are in error, and their error consists in opposing us". Here we have the desire for power cloaking itself in the language of modesty and humility.
3. It talks of the existence of certain "moral truths" which at present "can be known by all men with ease, with firm certainty . . ."
This is transparently absurd. The whole of western moral philosophy testifies to the fact that no alledged "moral truth" has ever gained consensus.
4. It claims that all sentient beings have "a resemblance to God" and mentions the "manifold perfections of creatures", and that "their truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God. Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures’ perfections as our starting point . . . "
How anyone can apply the words "perfection" (to say nothing of the "truth", "goodness", and beauty" of all animals) to the killing fields of the natural world is beyond me.
The author(s) don't appear to know that almost all species have become extinct. What concept of "perfection" have they in mind? The teeth of lions, for example, while not "perfect", are very well suited to ripping into the flesh of their prey, but I doubt their prey endorse and celebrate this fact as a piece of "perfection".
We don't need to invoke Darwin's troubling encounter with the Ichneumondae to see that their depiction of the natural world bears not the slightest resemblance to reality.
5.If the nature of God is to be inferred from the attributes, experiences and relations that obtain on earth between his creatures and the external world (as the above suggests) then the obvious answer is, i'm afraid, staring us in the face and it isn't at all edifying.
I'm sorry, but I simply can't take any of the above "arguments" or sentiments seriously; and now would be a good time, I think, to re-introduce Nietzsche back into this discussion, in order to remind us of a few salient facts regarding mankind and all moralistic metaphysics, Christianity included:
" 'According to nature' you want to live? O you noble Stoics, what deceptive words these are! Imagine a being like nature, wasteful beyond measure, indifferent beyond measure, without purposes and consideration, without mercy and justice, fertile and desolate and uncertain at the same time; imagine indifference itself as a power - how could you live according to this indifference? Is that not precisely wanting to be other than this nature? Is not living - estimating, preferring, being unjust, being limited - wanting to be different?
"And supposing your imperative 'live according to nature' meant at bottom as much as 'live according to life' - how could you not do that? Why make a principle of what you yourselves are and must be?
"In truth, the matter is altogether different: while you pretend rapturously to read the canon of your law in nature, you want something opposite, you strange actors and self-deceivers! Your pride wants to impose your morality, your ideal, on nature - even on nature - and incorporate them in her; you demand that she be nature 'according to the Stoa', and you would like all existence to exist only after your own image - as an immense eternal glorification and generalization of Stoicism.
"For all your love of truth, you have forced yourselves so long, so persistently, so rigidly-hypnotically to see nature the wrong way, namely Stoically, that you are no longer able to see her differently. And some abysmal arrogance finally still inspires you with the insane hope that because you know how to tyrannize over yourselves - Stoicism is self tyranny - nature, too, lets herself be tyrannized . . .
"But this is an ancient, eternal story: what formerly happened with the Stoics still happens today, too, as soon as any philosophy begins to believe in itself. It always creates the world in its own image; it cannot do otherwise. Philosophy is this tyrannical drive itself, the most spiritual will to power, to the "creation of the world," to the causa prima". (BGE.9).
Replace the word "Stoicism" here with "Christianity" and nothing substantive changes.
You are correct that I found the material impressive and some of it convincing. I don’t see how the writers of the catechism were DELIBERATELY contradictory and incoherent, if at all. They could be innocently oblivious to any sort of contradiction.
1. The claim that “human reason is, strictly speaking, truly capable by its own natural power and light of attaining to a true and certain knowledge of the one personal God, who watches over and controls the world by his providence” is one difficult for me to believe. It’s only when they add “there are many obstacles which prevent reason from the effective and fruitful use of this inborn faculty” and what follows does their claim that we can attain knowledge of God through reason seem remotely plausible. Of course, they could have slipped that part in so people who remain unconvinced by “reason” are just slaves to the obstacles that keep them from knowing God. Frankly, none of that is demonstrably true, it just follows from Christianity once one demonstrates that is true through some other principle, like the Resurrection.
2. “In plain language – ‘those who disagree or oppose our understanding of revelation are in error, and their error consists in opposing us’. Here we have the desire for power cloaking itself in the language of modesty and humility.” I’m not sure that it’s demonstrable that all of their language of modesty and humility is just a cloak hiding their desire for power. That sounds as demonstrable as the claim that “the human mind, in its turn, is hampered in the attaining of such truths . . . by disordered appetites which are the consequences of original sin.” Do you see the desire for power as a reason to discredit what they’re saying? That sounds like ad hominem. You have a good analogy with Marxism, but why should the insincerity of Catholics or Marxists disprove their explanations for all dissension?
3. You are right that there is no consensus on moral truths, etc. How does that reveal some transparent absurdity in the Catholic’s claim that there are "moral truths" which at present "can be known by all men with ease, with firm certainty . . ."? They made sure to explain that the reason why there is no consensus or firm certainty is because of “disordered appetites which are the consequences of original sin.” Most men go down the alley of “original sin” rather than unflinchingly search for the “moral truths” Catholics profess. I myself am inclined to agree with the Catholic view here.
4. I don’t think the Catholics are implying that there are no flaws to creation. Why exaggerate the flaws at the expense of any “perfections”? That seems as mistaken as exaggerating the perfections at the expense of the flaws. They don’t mean to say the entirety of creation is perfect. They mean bits and pieces of creatures are isolated “perfections.” I don’t see, though, how we humans can know which aspect of a creature is a perfection and which aspect a flaw. One could perceive even what most consider “beauty” as a monstrosity, like Edvard Munch sees the sunset in his painting the Scream: I went along the road with two friends— The sun set Suddenly the sky became blood—and I felt the breath of sadness A tearing pain beneath my heart I stopped—leaned against the fence—deathly tired Clouds over the fjord of blood dripped reeking with blood My friends went on but I just stood trembling with an open wound in my breast trembling with anxiety I heard a huge extraordinary scream pass through nature. (http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/excerpts/munch.asp).
But one could even see horrors like the Ichneumondae as beautiful. Guy Sircello “seemed to be able to find beauty almost everywhere, though he certainly did not think everything is beautiful. In the course of finding beauty even in Charles Beaudelaire’s infamous collection of poems, The Flowers of Evil, Sircello made this rather memorable observation: ‘beauty can bloom in the very anus of ugliness’” (book review by Charles Taliaferro on The Poetics of Evil). Undoubtedly that can apply to the likes of Ichneumondae and lion’s teeth.
My point here is that the Catholic’s mention of “truth, beauty, perfection” etc. of creatures can’t be proved or disproved. Beauty and ugliness seem to be matters of perspective, helplessly up for grabs. One simply has to presuppose there is an actual, accurate perspective on the matter, that it is the Catholic one, and then use that perspective as a starting point for talking about God’s beauty, etc. Obviously, there’s no point in trying to use nature as a starting point for talking about God if we have the wrong view of nature—supposing there is a right view of it.
5. I agree with you here. I don’t think we would be accurate in our attempts to assess God in light of creation. We could misinterpret creation, or incorrectly apply it to God. I don’t know if it’s wise to try and “learn about God” through nature: 1. We are intellectually unreliable 2. Nature is corrupt—both on Christianity in general, not just Catholicism.
Nietzsche’s quote is impressive, and I think in some cases it could be accurate—we just “would like all existence to exist only after [our] own image”—but I don’t see how this falsifies the Stoic’s, the Christian’s, the moralistic metaphysician’s etc. view of nature. He could still be right, however driven by the will to power he is. Do you apply this to yourself? Do you think that your interpretation of things is driven by a will to power?
1. Either reason alone is, or it is not, capable of attaining this "knowledge". If it is, as they claim, then let the rest of the world see the evidence of this momentous achievement. The non-appearance of this feat is itself proof that the claim is groundless, and has nothing whatever to do with so-called "disordered appetites" (a very convenient doctrine).
If another organisation or competing religion were to claim that, were it not for mankind's ineradicable "disordered appetites", every man, woman and child could, for example: climb Mount Everest in under an hour, fly like a bird to the moon, swim the Pacific in five minutes, heal every wound without any medical training, play the piano better than Mozart, correct Einstein's equations, etc, why shouldn't we believe it?
What's to stop a competing religion from claiming that it is Catholicism's "disordered appetites" that are preventing it from accepting the true (other) religion?
2. It is an incontestable fact that the Church seeks worldly power. The desire for power doesn't itself invalidate any truth claim, but it means that the evidence supposedly supporting these truth claims need to be rigorously scrutinised by the rest of us.
3. Then simply let those without "disordered appetites" (an extraordinarily presumptuous and censorious characterisation) reveal to the rest of humanity what methodology exactly they practised in order to arrive at these alleged moral truths?
"Revelations" are not socially credible arguments or evidence, since they provide no means to adjudicate between the conflicting "revelations" of others; to say nothing of those who would reject any alledged "revelation" as self-evidently non-binding on the rest of us.
4. There's no need here for any single, universal standard of "perfection". If any individual sentient being innocently or disproportionately suffers, then that suffering is a real and concrete reality for that creature.
If the Ichneumondae, for example, is to be considered as "beautiful", then there is no principled reason why every conceivable form of cruelty, agony, sadism and torture should not be also viewed as "beautiful".
These are instances of "beauty" that echo Nietzsche's claim in his first book The Birth of Tragedy, that if there is a God then its an aesthetic one, and not a moral one.
5. I don't think that Nature is in the slightest degree "corrupt". That is a value judgement with no rational or empirical foundation whatever.
It's true that we are far from omniscient, but that is no reason, as they say, to make the best an enemy of the better! We can, and have, made much intellectual progress in understanding the universe. In addition, if our rationality and empiricism is to be seen as "unreliable", then the same may be said regarding the veracity of people's "revelations".
The Stoic and Christian falsify Nature because Nature is indifferent, as Nietzsche makes clear. Nature neither knows nor cares, nature just is.
The (psychological) will to power is too subtle and complex to get into here. I don't know if you are familiar with Nietzsche's writing on the subject, but there is a thread here on the blog devoted to it if you're interested.
1. I suspect Catholics/Christians who believe reason alone can get us to a knowledge of God's existence and nature would appeal to these arguments (you might be familiar with them already): 1. Kalam Cosmological argument (which would prove that God is personal and powerful). 2. Argument from contingency (which would prove God is a necessary being). 3. Moral argument (which would prove that God's nature/character corresponds to what we classify "good"). The problem is that not everybody thinks these arguments are convincing. Then the Catholics could claim those who find them unconvincing are following their "disordered appetites." But, what about Christians who aren't convinced by them? I for one am leaning towards the idea that these arguments are useless. And what about non-Christians who find these arguments sound (though not necessarily convincing)? (as an atheist told WLC http://www.reasonablefaith.org/coming-to-love-god). The examples you give of counter-claims manage to put the Catholic back where he started. For now, I agree with you here.
2. I think that, in order to avoid biases that can affect our own judgment, it would be better to completely disregard the actual or perceived motivation behind anyone's claim. We should rigorously scrutinize all evidence and claims no matter who says the claim, or why. So, Catholics shouldn't automatically frown upon a non-Christian's claims and evidence just because they suspect disordered appetites are affecting it.
3. Revelations don't prove anything on their own, I agree. But, if there is something demonstrable, or rational, or constituting evidence that would lead to the conclusion "such-and-such revelation is true," then those revelations could serve as premises for something. If the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth actually happened, then it is highly probable that he is a reliable source of revelation.
4. When I was talking of beauty, I meant aesthetic and not moral beauty. It sounds like you may have been meaning moral beauty. So, we may have been talking past each other. I agree that there is not much moral beauty in the world. There is no moral beauty in sadism, although in some perverse way there could be "aesthetic" beauty.
5. I agree that there is no rational or empirical way to show nature is corrupt. My claim that it is corrupt is based on biblical revelation, which perhaps could have some external empirical or rational support as I explain in point 3.
I see now that I've been holding some contradictory views: "intellectual unreliability" and that we can show things are probably true with our "reason and evidence." I think "intellectual unreliability" should be rephrased as "unreliability" and then these views are not necessarily incompatible. We do resort to misusing reason and evidence to support our beliefs and reject others. In that way WE and our INTERPRETATIONS of the evidence can be unreliable, although our reason and evidence are NOT necessarily unreliable. That's when peer-review can come in and help reveal weaknesses.
I concede that Christianity claims "the whole creation groans" because of its "corruption" (Rom. 8:22), and this implies that nature knows and cares--unless in some way the verse does not mean that literally. It appears to me that nature neither knows nor cares. But, it also appears to me that there is no evidence for or against the notion that it doesn't care. The same goes for its "groaning in corruption," unless we take biblical revelation as evidence.
3. Yes indeed, but the $64,000 question is how does anyone reconcile this approach with your statement in #2 above and arrive at the conclusion that the revelation is just as it seems?
This has never been satisfactorily done for any alledged revelation, which is why before long we usually have to invoke concepts to remind the faithful that God transcends logic, reason and the limits of current empiricism.
That's, after all, why the concept of "faith" has any meaning at all. At some points, the believer simply has to make those leaps of faith, precisely because reason and evidence alone don't suffice to ground the claims.
4. Obviously, I don't believe in the Gods of ancient Greece, but the reality of human life and all history conforms more consistently to the character of these Gods. It's all nonsense, of course, but it does, in a naive fashion, explain why the world is as it is, far more credibly than any monotheistic and moralistic alternative i'm aware of.
The "problem of evil" as a conceptual, intellectual puzzle, simply vanishes in this model, because everything we see and experience in life conforms to our understanding of these Gods.
5. I wouldn't at all recommend to anyone Nietzsche as a substitute for Jesus, or theism generally, because Nietzsche, although at times brilliant, is also riddled with serious deficiencies and faults. However, if you can get hold of a copy of The Gay Science check out section 109 regarding humanity and Nature (i'm in agreement with virtually every word of this section).
I think there's plenty of evidence that Nature neither knows nor cares, but, it must also be admitted that this evidence (which is omnipresent) cannot be proven to be conclusive! Why? Because the theist or deist can always remind the atheist that appearance is not always synonymous with reality, and that behind and above the visible order of things a higher truth resides which will reveal that the appearance of a deaf and dumb Nature was due to our inability to understand and perceive the transcendent reality.
But an atheist like myself would simply counter that nothing whatsoever can be conclusively proved beyond the slightest doubt, but to take refuge in this "fact" is to set the epistemic bar very low indeed, since we can't rule out conclusively any point of view whatsoever.
What's required, I would argue, is for the strength of our beliefs to be proportionate to the evidence supporting them. And seen in this light, if Nature looks, feels, tastes and smells like it's unaware and unconcerned with human purposes, then it probably is.
When I say this, of course, i'm referring to Nature on the macroscopic scale. At more localised levels, Nature actually "cares" a great deal. Humans care, and I certainly care, but we must not make the mistake of confusing the character of the Parts with the character of the Whole. Many of the "parts" do care, that's obvious, but the "whole" neither knows nor cares about anything, including itself!
With regards to reconciling point 3 with point 2, there are sadly some aspects of revelation (even revelation itself) that end up being tossed into the bin of “just have faith.” The one exception I can think of now is the resurrection of Christ. Many books by scholars and historians have been written on the resurrection, treating it like other historical claims, as N.T. Wright should be doing in his “Christian Origins and the Question of God” series (I don’t necessarily consider his work conclusive, not having read it myself).
4. I never thought about it that way. That is something to think about for sure, thanks for bringing it up. I honestly am wondering why I have not seen any Christian “apologists” dealing with these kinds of objections.
5. I checked out the passage from the Gay Science you suggested. It makes so much sense, any attempt to argue against it would be like arguing against a brick wall. For now, I would say that’s the way the world is if God doesn’t exist. Have you heard of Thomas Nagel? His latest book (which I haven’t read), Mind and Cosmos, seems contrary to your own views (since you agree with Nietzsche’s passage in the Gay Science). I thought you might like to know it exists. He is an atheist, so no religious convictions are influencing his perspective.
You make a solid case for Nature’s indifference. What do you mean by care when you say humans “care”—unlike the whole of Nature? What do you and Nietzsche think about why humans “care”? Do you think animals could “care”?
But this response doesn't answer the methodological $64,000 question, for a very obvious reason. Let me quote Nietzsche, who was an accomplished philologist:
"What do I care for the contradictions of 'tradition'? How can legends of saints be called 'tradition' at all! The stories of the saints are the most ambiguous literature in existence: to apply to them scientific procedures when no other records are extant seems to me wrong in principle -mere idle learning". (A.28).
re: The "conceptual problem of evil".
Historians and anthropologists have revealed to us that humanity has believed in (i.e. created) literally thousands of religions. And, one of the startling things about this fact is that very few of these religions have any concept of a moral God(s) at work in the universe.
I think this is a very sobering and illuminating fact. It tells us, among other things, that the conceptual "problem of evil" is a very contingent social/historical phenomenon, and that this problem simply doesn't exist for most of our ancestors.
Only by positing the notion of a flawlessly "moral" God does this question arise. And because every piece of natural evidence and experience seems to contradict this notion, an elaborate and obscurantist theology is required in order to square this self-imposed circle.
I'm aware of, but haven't read any Nagel. I know that his latest book has received much criticism from certain naturalist thinkers (i'll reference some of the negative reviews of his latest book if you'd like?), but, being unfamiliar with his work i'm not in a position to comment.
We care, generally speaking, because we're here, because we exist. If our ancestors, didn't "care" then in all likelihood, we wouldn't have been born, and we wouldn't survive as a species.
We "care", as individuals, for the same reasons I gave earlier about why we have "morality". We care because indifference and neutrality, in very many situations, will bring us immense pain and suffering.
Whatever you may think of Richard Dawkins, for example, as a critic of theism, his strictly scientific work (e.g. The Selfish Gene) shows with admirable clarity why all living things "care".
We humans are ourselves part of Nature, and the capabilities we have that allow our species to continue over countless millennia, in often inhospitable environments, are all naturally acquired.
Here we have the illusion of "Design" by means of natural selection.
We, like every other living organism currently occupying the earth, don't come as a blank slate into the world. We inherent, quite naturally and unavoidably, a whole host of capabilities and predispositions, desires and aversions, anatomical structures, brain chemistry, etc, depending on our species.
The gazelles have fleet-of-foot and astonishing agility, while the lions chasing them have large teeth, claws and musculature.
The gazelles may be forgiven for supposing that the deity that made them was concerned with their welfare, because they have been naturally endowed with many features that allow them to elude predators. Equally, the lions may share the same conceit, because they too seem to have been "designed" to catch and kill gazelles.
But when we stand back we see, sadly, that this state of affairs doesn't exist because two opposing deities have taken an interest in lions and gazelles, or that a monotheistic God has contradictory tendencies regarding these creatures.
What we see, rather, is that the same impersonal, purposeless natural forces have manifested themselves in two different ways, and that a plague, flood, drought, or asteroid may, at any time, obliterate both of these species without "reason". Because, at the macroscopic level, Nature is indifferent. Not cruel, malicious, evil, or corrupt, simply unaware and unknowing.
Generally speaking, the Mother of any species is biologically predisposed to have certain maternal instincts towards her offspring. Why? Because without these protective and nurturing instincts and predispositions, the offspring are more likely to die, and die young.
And, being dead, their genetic material is not therefore continued into future generations. Thus the I-couldn't-care-less-about-my-offspring behaviour is rare in nature simply because this behaviour isn't favoured by natural selection, because it's statistically unlikely to result in healthy offspring who will reach sexual maturity and propagate the species. Thus the world becomes increasingly filled with creatures who care for their offspring, etc . . .
Nietzsche's answer to this question would depend upon what mood he was in at the time of writing. If he was in the full thrall of the will to power mood, he would say that we "care", ultimately, because "caring" allows us to experience the feeling of power, which is what, deep down, we most want.
For a very brief outline of this view, see, for example, The Gay Science, section 13.
But, I must emphasise that nothing i've said here comes close to being adequate to the subject matter. "Caring" generally, and even the "will to power" in Nietzsche, are both far too complex to be captured in a few words by me. All i've done here is attempt to highlight the (theoretical) direction of travel and to suggest that "caring" is not a primary and fundamental property of the universe, but an emergent property. But, it's no less important and valuable for all that . . .
I don’t see how Nietzsche’s quote on saints applies to the resurrection. After all, the sources of information on Jesus are considered by historians to be generally reliable. They don’t require a non-Christian source in order for the information in the gospels to be historical. Bart Ehrman, for example, says, “The resurrection of Jesus lies at the heart of Christian faith. Unfortunately, it also is a tradition about Jesus that historians have difficulty dealing with. As I said, there are a couple of things that we can say for certain about Jesus after his death. We can say with relative certainty, for example, that he was buried. I say with relative certainty because historians do have some questions about the traditions of Jesus' burial. . . . Some scholars have argued that it's more plausible that in fact Jesus was placed in a common burial plot, which sometimes happened, or was, as many other crucified people, simply left to be eaten by scavenging animals (which also happened commonly for crucified persons in the Roman Empire). But the accounts are fairly unanimous in saying (the earliest accounts we have are unanimous in saying) that Jesus was in fact buried by this fellow, Joseph of Arimathea, and so it's relatively reliable that that's what happened. We also have solid traditions to indicate that women found this tomb empty three days later. This is attested in all of our gospel sources, early and late, and so it appears to be a historical datum. As so I think we can say that after Jesus' death, with some (probably with some) certainty, that he was buried, possibly by this fellow, Joseph of Arimathea, and that three days later he appeared not to have been in his tomb (Bart Ehrman, From Jesus to Constantine: A History of Early Christianity, Lecture 4: "Oral and Written Traditions about Jesus" [The Teaching Company, 2003].) Bart Ehrman is non-Christian, but he takes the gospels seriously (e.g. “solid traditions,” “relatively reliable,” “some certainty”).
You’ve elsewhere mentioned that the invention of an all-loving God is motivated by a psychological desire. Why are Judaism, Islam, and Christianity(and possibly others I’m unaware of) the only religions out of thousands that exhibit “this desire, this wish and longing for such a being . . . rooted in dissatisfaction with actuality, as an escape from the often grubby, tragic and woefully inadequate manifestations of even the best that merely human love has to offer”? Why invent a God seemingly contrary to everything we know and that is incomprehensible, etc.?
I would like to read the negative reviews of Nagel’s book.
Alright, thanks for that explanation of caring. It makes a lot of sense. I will hopefully get around to reading The Gay Science passage you mention.
re: The Resurrection: Nothing would have been easier than for Jesus to appear, after crucifixion, in clear sight of the soldiers who killed him, the priests and Pharisees who wanted his death, and Pilate, to name but a few.
But for some reason, God chose to demonstrate his power over natural death by showing himself to only a few people, for a very brief amount of time, far from the most publicly verifiable gaze. This makes no sense at all.
God, the supreme being of the universe, the creator of galaxies and atoms and everything else in-between, takes on human form and suffers the most appaling tortures in order to redeem humanity, nevertheless chooses to only reveal his greatest miracle to a few common people in an obscure part of the earth. Moreover, it never occurs to any of the disciples to ask the resurrected Jesus "Why are you now leaving us and the world? Surely now is the time to reveal yourself and your message to the widest possible audience, so that they, and future generations, will have a historical record, from a diverse number of sources, testifying to your divinity"? etc etc etc . . .
No doubt, theologians have nifty answers to such questions, but I find none of them remotely convincing. We return, once again, to the questions at the heart of 'The Grand Inquisitor' passage, and the will of God to remain, in spite of Jesus's suffering and resurrection, an essentially hidden God.
re: Ehrman
Who is the source of these "accounts" he mentions and how long after Jesus's death do they surface?
I would think the phrase "solid tradition" is a contradiction in terms as regards the tradition's assertions. I don't doubt that many "traditions" are "solid", if by that we mean that within certain communities belief in the reality of X has been affirmed by successive generations within that community. But that only puts things on a par with, for example, Zeus and Achilles. No one denies that many Greeks sincerely believed in the reality of these figures, but that doesn't give the "solid tradition" any epistemic weight.
Ehrman also mentions the "solid tradition" of a few women finding an empty tomb 3 days after Jesus's death, and because this is common to all four gospels he then categorises it as a "historical datum"!
Correct me if i'm wrong, but I was under the impression that the earliest of the Gospels were written roughly 40 years after Jesus's death? It should be obvious that none of this constitutes serious and reliable evidence, and an empty tomb doesn't equate to a miracle having taken place. Also, I would have thought that if Ehrman wasn't a Christian that was itself proof that, for him, no resurrection actually occurred.
I'm no theologian, but I personally think of the fundamental message and acts of Jesus as largely unique among the Abrahamic religions. i.e. resist not evil, love your enemies, love one another etc.
As i've said before, I don't think this message really belongs in any organised, monotheistic religion that i'm aware of. I think it's purely an accident of history and geography that Jesus was incorporated into what became "Christianity". I think "Christianity" makes use of Jesus's name, but it's really the invention of Paul and later figures and has very little to do with Jesus (as I see him).
So, I don't think it's true that other monotheistic religions exhibit the same desire as Jesus for a wholly loving God. If you think i've said that then I haven't been sufficiently clear. In my posts of 19/2/13 I tried to answer this question schematically in seven points.
To simplify: for a very few, such as Jesus, the idea of a loving God was a consequence of an extreme susceptibility to suffer, but for the overwheliming majority, it grew out of expediency and ressentiment. It was (and is) a form of spiritual revenge, a way of interpreting failure as success, impotency as power, and hatred as righteous etc.
One of the saddest things I ever read was that many Franciscan monks, after the death of St. Francis, were among the most eager persecutors in the Inquisition. Nietzsche never mentions this fact, but it is entirely consistent with his general appraisal of humanity. People like St. Francis really are full of love, gentleness and good-will, but for most, "goodness" is only a sham, an empty word.
But being dissatisfied with actuality is a different, but related, phenomenon, and this is a rather widespread judgement that applies far beyond the Abrahamic religions. Indeed, it is hard to think of any civilisation or religion that, as a matter of doctrine, has ever preached affirmation of actuality (a few mystics aside). I certainly can't think of one.
Put simply: what religion has ever had at its core a message such as the following:
"Spend most of your time and energy trying to make life pleasurable, dignified and meaningful, for yourself and all of humanity. Let no tradition or orthodoxy or unverifiable dogma prevent you from this endeavour. Your primary duty is to yourself, the world you inhabit, and the beings within it. No one knows if there is life after death, there are only opinions, and opinions are diverse and often contradictory. So beware of those who pretend to know more than they possibly can know, especially when their opinions involve categorical demands on others against their will.
"Whether this is the only world or not, make the most of it and seek to understand and improve it in its own terms. God (if He exists) is not offended if you are happy and in love with life, he wants you to take concrete steps to improve your existence, using your reason and the evidence of your senses. God is so vastly your superior in every way, and it is an insult to his majesty and grandeur to think he concerns himself with mundane and petty rituals and doctrines. If he wants to impart some very important and specific information to you all, you may rest assured he can easily accomplish this feat without the slightest possibility of any ambiguity or misinterpretation. Therefore, be true to the earth and the reality of your lives, and strive to make existence as bearable or as happy as you can".
You won't be impressed by this "nifty" answer to why God remains hidden (since you've already heard it), but I would say Pascal had an interesting point when he said "there is enough light for those who desire only to see, and enough darkness for those of a contrary disposition" (P. 29). The problem is that many people actually "want to see" but just find too much "darkness" anyway (like Robert Lawrence Kuhn, according to his narration in Closer to Truth). So, as it turns out, neither of us are impressed by Pascal's nifty answer. I'll probably think about God's being hidden some more, and if there is any additional relevancy to Nietzsche or Pascal I will post about it. Otherwise, it seems very strange to us both that the disciples didn't ask Jesus any of those obvious questions.
You're correct that the first gospel was written roughly forty years after the events it records. You're also correct that an empty tomb doesn't mean a miracle has occurred. I didn't mean by citing Ehrman that proved the resurrection happened. I meant that even a non-Christian considers the gospels generally reliable historical documents. We have, unlike with many stories of saints, evidence (historical evidence, not speculation) that a resurrection could have occurred--1. empty tomb 2. eyewitnesses claim to have seen Jesus after his death 3. the disciples (among others) actually believed Jesus rose from the dead, "despite having a predisposition to the contrary"--WLC (since Jews did not believe the Messiah was going die and rise from the dead). I disagree that the gospels don't constitute "serious and reliable evidence." To quote the book Reinventing Jesus, "The stories about Jesus and the sayings of Jesus would have been repeated hundreds, perhaps thousands, of times by dozens of eyewitnesses before the first Gospel was ever penned" (29). There would be probably still be eyewitnesses around to confirm or deny what was written in the gospels. It also takes, on average, a lot longer than forty years for myths and legends to infiltrate history. Take, for example, an adult who knew Pascal and told stories to his kid who later penned them--we don't say those stories are unreliable. One generation is not enough for serious corruption to take place, especially when that kid could go around and ask other eyewitnesses of Pascal.
Thanks for linking the reviews of Nagel's book.
Does Nietzsche anywhere talk about Paul, or does he only address Jesus?
What do you mean by "loving God"?
That story about the Franciscan monks is shocking. I would have thought they aimed to follow in St. Francis' footsteps, not compensate for their loss by torturing heretics. It does serve as evidence of Nietzsche's idea of ressentiment.
That message of religion's core seems the opposite of most religions' actual message, especially if--as you say--religion tends to NOT preach "affirmation of actuality." The message sounds like an affirmation of actuality (as you view actuality). Could you explain why you're construing religion this way?
Plato spent a great deal of time explaining how pious fraud (as he saw it) should be (and could be) established in a society by the second generation.
Bertrand Russell: "Plato is right in thinking that belief in this myth could be generated in two generations. The Japanese have been taught since 1868 that the Mikado is descended from the sun-goddess, and that Japan was created earlier than the rest of the world. Any university professor, who, even in a learned work, throws doubt on these dogmas, is dismissed for un-Japanese activities".
Given that the majority of early Christians were uneducated people, socialised in an enviornment where critical thinking and scepticism were alien, without access to or knowledge of an interpretive method that is guided by principles of rigorous verification and falsification, i'd say that their beliefs, especially regarding such weighty topics as God, salvation, and eternity, are anything but credible.
Only the other day I was re-reading Tacitus (nothing to do with Christianity). At one point he talks about strange events being reported at significant periods in Roman history, such as a women giving birth to a snake.
I remember many years ago watching a tv programme about an American marathon runner (I don't remember his name) visiting China. It was probably related to Nixon's engagement with China. Anyway, he would run through numerous Chinese towns, followed by a film crew, and was flattered that, at each location, so many locals were lining the streets to see him. He admitted to being pleasantly surprised by this as he assumed he was unknown in China, so he asked one of his Chinese guides about it. The guide explained that many Chinese believed that Americans/Westerners had a tail, and so the crowds were there to see the tail of the foreigner!!
Religion and actuality:
I don't understand your question.
Nietzsche and Paul:
Nietzsche mentions Paul several times. He has a very low opinion of him.
e.g. If you can get access to Daybreak, see sections 68 & 72, this will give you a flavour of Nietzsche's opinion of Paul.
If you can't get hold of a copy of Daybreak there are some less than perfect translations of Nietzsche's works on line:
I agree with Plato that legends etc. can develop by the second generation. The later gospels (ca. 90 AD) of Peter, Thomas, John etc. tend to be increasingly bizarre (e.g. a talking cross). I think that at least what the apostles taught about Jesus' life, though (as seen in their epistles--unless those are forgeries) would be credible, since they claim to be eyewitnesses. I doubt that pious fraud could develop within their own teachings while they were alive (unless their teaching was insincere).
My question about religion and actuality was why would you say that (referring to two paragraphs at the bottom of your post of 28 February) this is the core of religion's message? The core of religion's message seems the opposite of what you claim it is.
Thanks for pointing out where to find his views on Paul. I will wait to read them when I have the actual Daybreak book then.
Apologies. I thought I was clear that the spirit and content of those two paragraphs are fundamentally alien to religion. That's the point, as we both agree. Christianity is built on a negation of actuality and natural humanity.
This begs the question: why has hatred of reality taken such a hold on humanity? Why is it unable or unwilling to affirm actuality? And my embryonic response to that question is contained in the 7 point post of 19/2/13 above.
I do not see how being all-powerful is inconsistent with being changeless by nature, or at least an essentially changeless character that is not based on God’s arbitrary choice. Omnipotence is defined as follows: “God is able to bring about any state of affairs which it is logically possible for anyone in that situation to bring about. What this would imply is that God cannot do things that are logically impossible. God cannot act contrary to his nature or bring about infeasible worlds. But he can bring about any state of affairs in which it is logically possible for someone in his situation to bring about” (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/defenders-2-podcast/transcript/s3-16)
“If God's status as an all-powerful being is (axiomatically) true, then it follows that God's character can be as changeable as He likes, and that if God is unchanging it is soley because He desires it (for his own, inscrutable reasons) and not due to any other source of constraint.” Being omnipotent does not entail freedom from all “constraints.” Since God would not be able to realize logical impossibilities, we could classify logical impossibilities as “constraints”—although someone might argue that logic is a part of God’s “nature” just as the “good” is, so that it is absurd to talk about logical constraints; God’s nature determines what is logical or something like that.
Acting contrary to his nature (which the definition of omnipotence denies) could include changing his character. The presupposition here is that God’s nature was not some sort of blank-slate that he could “draw on” as he pleased. Using reason and experience alone, I don’t see how we could say he did or didn’t desire himself to be changeless—unless we place merit on Aristotle’s “unmoved mover,” or “unchanged changer.”
This is where “perfect being theology” comes in. Perfect being theologians aim to maximize God’s greatness in describing the attributes of God. My problem with this theology is that it is based on intuitive notions of “Great.” Nevertheless, they would reply to your claim about omnipotence and God’s ability to change himself in a manner similar to this:
“When your friend says that an all-powerful being will have as few constraints as possible, he's giving expression to the typical Islamic view of God's power that trumps everything, even His own nature. God is so powerful that he could say to faithful Muslims on the Day of Judgement, ‘Ha, ha! I tricked you! I'm sending all of you to eternal hell for believing in me and my Prophet!’ On this view God is not constrained even by His own goodness. Now I disagree completely that this makes God a greater being. Quite the contrary, such a capricious Deity is morally flawed and therefore not perfect. We must insist that God's omnipotence operates consistently with His moral perfection.” http://www.reasonablefaith.org/is-the-islamic-conception-of-god-morally-inadequate#ixzz2JbTNeBx3
The idea is that if God is the “greatest possible being,” then he can’t make himself be something than what he already is: great. Nothing can improve him, and nothing can detract from him. If that were the case, then he wouldn’t be the greatest conceivable being. God’s omnipotence does not mean he can change himself, since that would mean he isn’t the greatest conceivable being. Technically, though, God could change himself if this change is not one that improves or detracts from him as the “greatest possible being.” I can’t think of an example of what kind of change that would be.
I'm aware that many theologians (and some historic philosophers) have attempted to delimit a priori what does, and does not, apply to (the concept of) God, and the notion of there being certain insurmountable "constraints" in the form of "logical impossibilities" is one such candidate.
I find these disputes to be much ado about nothing and inherently contradictory. If one accepts (as I don't) the notion of a personal God, who is Himself uncaused and the Prime Mover behind all phenomena, eternal and yet unfathomably complex, then such a being is already, ipso facto, not subject to our ideas of inherent "logical impossibilities".
Also, who exactly, and by what authority, is it declared that "God cannot act contrary to His nature"? Does God Himself have a say in this? These assertions, along with the "Perfect Being Theology" you cite, strike me as fanciful, highly presumptuous and lacking dialectical rigour. Moreover, they all seem instances of the "No true Scotsman" fallacy.
I also find it ironic in the extreme that a God who is depicted as supremely powerful is thereby described as "morally flawed" and therefore not (really) God at all; while a God who creates and silently watches over, for millions of years, the innumerable instances of suffering and cruelty endured by humans and animals, is behaving "consistently with His moral perfection".
This is a conception of "moral perfection" that, to me, beggars belief.
If one is determined to embrace a kind of Panglossian perspective as a means of glossing over the "problem of evil", then why not go the full hog and take sides with Spinoza and pantheism?
Let me end with a very obvious but important observation - none of this armchair hair-splitting and a priori philosophising about the contested CONCEPT of God brings us one step closer to any particular religion or alleged personal revelation. Nor does it ground any specific normative claim. And it is worth remembering that none of the monotheistic religions, in their founding texts, seek to seriously engage with these rationalistic or evidenciary concerns.
The very existence of theology, in my opinion, is proof that something is wrong with the whole enterprise, that things are not what they seem.
I'll let Nietzsche speak:
"A God who is all-knowing and all-powerful and who does not even make sure that his creatures understand his intention - could that be a god of goodness? Who allows countless doubts and dubieties to persist, for thousands of years, as though the salvation of mankind were unaffected by them, and who on the other hand holds out the prospect of frightful consequences if any mistake is made as to the nature of the truth"? (Daybreak.91).
I agree with your views of Perfect Being Theology and a priori assumptions about God.
I agree with your point about the supremely powerful God being "morally flawed" while a God who remains silent during millions of years of human and animal suffering can get away with "moral perfection."
I'm not sure that the Koran and Bible fail to seriously engage with "these rationalistic or evidenciary concerns." At least when it comes to the problem of evil, the book of Job goes on and on about it. The "answer" given in Job is highly unsatisfactory to us humans, but I don't see why that implies the writer of Job wasn't seriously thinking and engaging the problem of evil.
Could you elaborate on why the existence of theology "is proof that things are not what they seem"?
The quote from Nietzsche is compelling to me. But, I know of a similar attitude from Christopher Hitchens. WLC seemingly refutes him:
"Well now Mr. Hitchens says, 'But why did God wait so long before he sent Christ? Human beings have existed for thousands of years on this planet before Christ's coming.' Well, what's really crucial here is not the time involved rather it's the population of the world. The population reference bureau estimates that the number of people who have ever lived on this planet is about 105 billion people. Only 2% of them were born prior to the advent of Christ." (http://hitchensdebates.blogspot.com/2010/07/hitchens-vs-craig-biola-university.html)
Here's Hitchens' response: "Dr. Craig talks as if, 'Ok, but since then they'll be more people born so it might have been a good time in terms of population growth,' well, there are a huge number of people who still haven't even heard of this idea [of Christianity]. The news hasn't penetrated to them, or where it has, it's been brought to them by people who Dr. Craig doesn't think of as Christians, such as Mormons, for example, and it's taught to them in many discrepant and competitive and indeed incompatible and violently irreconcilable ways." (from same debate)
The Book of Job, to me, is another clear example that, theological gymnastics aside, Might is Right.
Intellectually, the Bible doesn't really take the "problem of evil" seriously at all, because it will not and cannot present to the reader any sincere and rigorous non-theistic alternative.
In Shakespeare we find: "As flies to wanton boys are we to the Gods. They kill us for their sport."
Now this notion, as i've previously indicated, was not unknown to the Greek thinkers and even to the Greek religion itself. And some Greek thinkers entertained the possibility that the Gods were indifferent to human affairs entirely. Which, if any, of these ideas are true, is not the point. The point is that, within the context of the Bible, no decent and intelligent person is ever shown to be defending such thoughts, and consequently, such an outlook is never seriously engaged.
My guess is that if Job, or any another individual placed in a similar historical circumstances, were to maintain that God doesn't exist, or doesn't concern himself with human affairs, or takes pleasure in human suffering, he would not be intellectually challenged, or socially shunned for having such opinions, he would simply have been killed. And because having such opinions got you killed, such opinions were never seriously addressed, intellectually speaking.
Theology, for me, is proof of the human hand behind religion. If God wishes something of extraordinary importance to be clearly known by all humanity then there should be no need whatsoever for scholarly hermeneutics of any kind. If the meaning of Jesus, living and "dying" amongst us, is not concretely self-evident and unequivocal to all humanity, but requires intermediaries and scholars to interpret it for us, then that already assigns more de facto importance to the interpreter than it does to the life of Jesus.
Theology, by its very existence, presupposes that the acts and words of Jesus were not, by themselves, sufficient for humanity. And given this insufficiency, why did Jesus come at all?
p.s. Dostoyevsky's Grand Inquisitor passage is perhaps the most eloquent and heartfelt engagement with this question that i've come across.
WLC:
1. I seem to remember Jesus showing concern for even one sheep that goes astray, but according to WLC if over two billion human beings were born too early, that's not a problem!
2. Suffering didn't suddenly stop once Jesus arrived.
Nietzsche's point is significantly different from Hitchens's. Nietzsche's main point is that even after Jesus, it's far from clear what the whole point of his visit was, and that "getting things wrong", theologically speaking, can have the severest consequences. Hitchens, I take it, was stressing the actual suffering that people endured prior to Jesus's intervention.
I'm not sure (probably because this is contradictory to much of the rest of the Bible), but I'm inclined to agree that the ultimate outlook of the book of Job has is "Might is Right." You are also correct that the Bible never presents a non-theistic viewpoint on anything nor an atheistic alternative to answer the problem of evil. But, Job actually doubts God's "goodness" and even seems convinced he is capricious or indifferent towards mankind:
"'Though I am in the right, my own mouth would condemn me; though I am blameless, he [God] would prove me perverse. I am blameless; I regard not myself; I loathe my life. It is all one; therefore I say, he destroys both the blameless and the wicked. When disaster brings sudden death, he mocks at the calamity of the innocent. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked; he covers the faces of its judges- if it is not he, who then is it?'" (Job 9:20-24).
This one makes God out to be deceitful, unmerciful and unforgiving: "'You [God] have granted me life and steadfast love, and your care has preserved my spirit. Yet these things you hid in your heart; I know that this was your purpose. If I sin, you watch me and do not acquit me of my iniquity. If I am guilty, woe to me! If I am in the right, I cannot lift up my head, for I am filled with disgrace and look on my affliction. And were my head lifted up, you would hunt me like a lion and again work wonders against me '" (Job 10:12-16).
His friends try to challenge him (maybe not intellectually), but nobody tries to shun Job for his views (they shun him for other reasons) let alone even suggest killing him. His wife actually encourages him to renounce God, telling him, "Curse God and die" (Job 2:9). What's important to notice is that the book of Job, including its "unorthodox" complaints against God, is in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. If they wanted to shut up dissenters, they would not have put the book of Job in the Bible--unless it was meant to refute dissenters since the final answer of God to Job is that Job is a finite human and can't know why God lets terrible things happen to good people etc.
As a side note, no where in the Mosaic Law does it say those who questioned God were to be killed. Sorcerers, those who worshipped idols and gods beside YHWH, and blasphemers of God were to be killed, but none of these crimes necessarily denotes questioning God.
You are exactly right that God doesn't need scholarly hermeneutics to tell the world something extraordinarily important and vital for salvation. I didn't mean that we can't know what God means or what Jesus means without an intermediary. When the apostles (you might contend that they were acting as intermediaries) preached the gospel, all that was required to understand was along the lines as follows: "Repent and be baptized . . . for the forgiveness of sins" (Acts 2:38)and to believe that "[t]hey put him [Jesus] to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day . . . [H]e is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. . . . everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name" (Acts 10:39-40, 42-43). As far as I see, there is nothing scholarly about it. Anybody can understand the basic requisites. Based on what the apostles taught (derived from the acts and teachings of Jesus), Jesus' acts and words were indeed sufficient for humanity. These basic requisites seem to me self-evident and unequivocal to anybody who is told or reads about them. Even so, that doesn't mean nobody will deny them or twist them around. Of course, the "heretics" could level the claim that the "orthodox" are the ones who deny and twist things around. That's when "scholarly hermeneutics" and whatnot come into play.
I read the Grand Inquisitor passage, and it is a heartfelt engagement with the question. I'm sure it applies to some periods in history (such as during the Spanish Inquisition) when the Church went whacko and became too controlling and paranoid about theology and orthodoxy. But, I don't think it applies to the Church at all times and all places. The Catholic Church's current, official (though not actually maintained by all Catholics) view on this question can be heard in this 50-second video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGmLRSWuUwY
1. You have a good point; I agree that this is a discrepancy unless it be resolved by some "scholarly hermeneutics" or something similar. There is a somewhat ambiguous passage in the NT that might be relevant here. Some people interpret as referring just to believers in God before the coming of Christ, but that doesn't seem to be entirely accurate: "For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared. . . . For this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh they way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does" (1 Peter 3:18-20; 4:6). This constitutes an example of something that probably requires "scholarly hermeneutics" to get a good idea of what it means out of it. It sounds as though its saying those who died during the flood or before the flood (whose disobedience led to God eventually unleashing the flood) had a chance to hear the gospel and so be saved. In which case, at least some of those two billion people, "lost sheep," did not have to remain lost. If that interpretation of the passage is false, then of course it doesn't resolve the problem, but it's the best I can think of.
2. Surely nobody could disagree with this point. I don't think Craig was thinking so much of suffering, however, as he was ignorance of God/Christ, especially since Christianity claims that "there is salvation in no one else [but Christ]" (Acts 4:12).
Alright, I now see a difference between Hitchens and Nietzsche on the topic. I would add that Hitchens appears to be stressing not only the actual suffering people endured but also the impossibility that they would ever have a chance of "redemption" or recompense of that suffering in heaven because they were born before Jesus and never could believe in him (which might be resolved by the passage from 1 Peter mentioned above).
a)The Book of Job: At times Job speaks very eloquently (it's been a very long time since I read it), voicing his incomprehension at the apparent injustice of his lot, after initially enduring much pain without any serious complaint. Is it to the Bible's credit to publicise his complaints? I would say No, because none of his serious complaints (and many others I can think of that he never voices) are ever really answered and he is happy, in the end, to accept this substantive silence once he is confronted by God's superior power.
Given that Job is depicted as the most pious man on the face of the earth, the moral of the tale seems clear: If Job, in the end, can renounce all his questions and complaints and humbly submit to the inscrutable will of God in the midst of his extreme suffering (without receiving even the slightest morally comprehensible explanation from God), what moral justification do the rest of us have to question God's will?
b) Jesus: But saying Jesus died for our sins and through him we can achieve salvation is ambiguous and insufficient in the extreme, because Jesus, at no point in the Gospels, actually sets out and explains just what "sin" and "salvation" actually means and how these concepts are grounded.
c)The indispensability of Jesus's message: There are two different, but related, points here.
(i)Those countless millions who, for whatever reason, lived and died without ever having heard of Jesus.
(ii) Those countless millions who have read the Gospels (or have been informed of their contents by various intermediaries) and disagree profoundly (and often violently) on how it is to be interpreted.
Take Pascal himself as an example - Pascal is supposed to have been blessed by a personal revelation from, or a revelation sanctioned by, God, Jesus Christ. This is the most significant episode in his entire life, naturally enough. However, even after this visitation, we find Pascal, in horror and bewildering despair, freely confessing his ignorance of his "duty".
Something is clearly wrong here. If one of the foremost minds of the age, even after receiving a personal visitation from transcendence that confirms to him that Jesus is God and saviour, still agonises over his profound ignorance on some of the most important and pressing questions which may determine the fate of his eternal soul, then it is incontestably true that things are far from self-evident.
(c) The Grand Inquisitor: The historical wickedness of the Church and the Grand Inquisitor's own political (i.e. cynical/paternalistic) agenda, though important, are not the crux of the issue in question - the central issue is Christ's silence, his refusal to actually explain himself, his message and his methods. That point is as relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago, and no amount of sympathetic exegesis will make it go away.
Similarly, Pilate's perfectly reasonable question "What is truth"? remains entirely legitimate, and to repeat variations of the phrase "God/Jesus is truth" as a response to this question, is simply a way of avoiding the seriousness of the question.
You're right to point out that Jesus doesn't expound on the meaning of sin and salvation. In the book of John, he talks about salvation a great deal, although he isn't easy to understand (hence the need for an interpreter). So, apparently he passed down the meaning to his apostles--and we have their writings, and from them we can glean what Jesus meant by sin and salvation. Then there is the question of what the apostles meant--the Catholics and Protestants disagree there. Sin, I believe, meant to the Jews transgressing God's law (as set out in the Torah). Salvation is more ambiguous though, and I hardly know what to make of it myself based on the NT writings. The Jews did not believe in a need to be "saved from sin" (they had ways to "atone" without Jesus); they believed in a need to be "saved from their Gentile oppressors." So, the whole concept of "salvation from sin" that Jesus brought onto the scene is alien to Judaism, I suspect.
I don't understand what you mean by Pascal's "ignorance of his 'duty" and "pressing questions which may determine the fate of his eternal soul." Which Pensées do you have in mind?
Well, I'm not Catholic, but I know the Catholic Church believes that Christ has not been silent, and that he has been explaining himself, his message, and his methods (not sure what you mean by methods--deeds?) through the Church throughout history. The Church is, after all, called the "body of Christ." The problem has never been Christ's silence; it's been man's weakness. The Bible has multiple accounts of how the Church fails in various ways because of its members (which Jesus despises, see Rev. 3:14-22). This occurs not because of Christ neglecting the members but by the members neglecting Christ. I doubt you will find that an impressive answer, but I think that's the answer the Church would give.
By "What is truth?" did Pilate mean "What's true?" or did he mean "What is the definition of the word truth?" Either way, at least some Christians who say "Jesus is truth" probably aren't trying to avoid the seriousness of Pilate's request, they're probably meaning it sincerely and gravely.
By "methods and means" I mean such simple, but unanswered questions as: Why did you come at this particular time and place? Why perform miracles? Why do we need to be redeemed? Why do children suffer and die? Why do millions of animals regularly have to kill one another? Why are you relying on fishermen and the like, unsophisticated and powerless people, to relay your message to the world? Why are you leaving us? etc
As i've said, Christ's silence in 'The Grand Inquisitor' passage mirrors his silence on these maters in the Gospels. In fact it's worse than that, in the Gospels no one even approaching Dostoevsky's seriousness ever speaks with Jesus.
But "Jesus is truth", whether true or not, is merely a succession of words. Neither Pilate nor the rest of us have any way of knowing why these precise words should be privileged over different successions of words saying very different things. We can't possibly believe that something is true simply because someone says it's true. We want evidence, and evidence is precisely what Jesus refuses to give Pilate and the rest of us.
I'm not sure how much further we can profitably go with all this. I don't wish to persuade anyone out of their belief. On the other hand, the notion of a personal, interventionist God, in any form, is one I cannot comprehend.
Two, rather different, if related, conceptions of God are often visible nowadays: firstly, a God-of-the-gaps; and secondly, a God of consolation or categorical moral demands. The first type is of no interest to me, nor science. The second type I gave up on a very long time ago. I appreciate that many worthy and respectable people affirm the second type, and, in a nutshell, good luck to them. However, it's most definitely not for me.
I read the Pensées you cite, and I see what you mean about Pascal's anguish. But, I had always interpreted that passage not as Pascal's own experience but as his attempt to see the world through the eyes of a person searching for truth, perhaps a person who is reading his finished Apologia and considering what he says in it. That seems like speculation, but my reason for interpreting it that way comes from Pensées 427, when he says, "Who would wish to have as his friend a man who argued like that?" referring to three previous paragraphs written from the perspective of a person not searching for truth. The difficulty is that there is no context with which to interpret 429, unless you consider the sentence "I envy those of the faithful...." to be a context for the rest of the fragment. The context seems ambiguous, though. There is also Pensées 471, which doesn't square with Pascal's attitude in 429 (unless he is mood-dependent like Nietzsche, as you have mentioned). He does sound decidedly unhappy in 896 (see below).
I think that the only answer, albeit highly unsatisfactory to you, for Jesus' explaining himself and his "methods and means" could be the one given in Job--"what moral justification do the rest of us have to question God's will?" But then, I would like to know why, if God created us, he made us incapable of comprehending him. That failure to comprehend God leads to countless problems, like "why do children suffer and die?". The only supposed answer is the one of original sin, that we "used" to be able to comprehend God. But, then we have a problem Pascal seemed to share:
"My God, what stupid arguments! Would God have created the world in order to damn it? Would he ask so much of such feeble people? Scepticism is the cure for this disease, and will put this vanity in its place" (P 896).
Jesus did actually claim to give evidence, the evidence of "miracles." Unfortunately, that evidence only sometimes worked for those who observed it. There was also the evidence of Moses and the Prophets, and Jesus' words themselves, but that evidence apparently has been sufficient for hardly anybody.
I still think there are some false views (maybe overly narrow-minded) that both of us retain, and we can profit if there's mutual correction as needed. But, when we reach standstills or agreement on any topic (such as the Canaanite slaughter), it would be best to drop it. The problem of the hiddenness of God doesn't seem to be going anywhere; we basically agree on it.
I realize that you're not interested in changing your mind about God, but I hope that doesn't mean we can't talk about how Nietzsche and/or Pascal view God and your opinion on their views.
Yes, in a nutshell, I think Pascal was, like Nietzsche, very mood-dependent (in a very non-trivial sense).
One of the things that Nietzsche and Pascal agree on (and they agree on many important questions) is that our reasoning faculty is not an autonomous entity, over and above our emotions, instincts, impulses etc.
Pascal:"All our reasoning comes down to surrendering to feeling. . . Reason is available but can be bent in any direction. And so there is no rule". (P.530).
What this means, if taken seriously, is that some form of "mood-dependency" is always operative, in all of us, all of the time. And both of them are explicit in pointing out that we don't actually choose our own words and thoughts; rather, our thoughts and words emerge from a domain unknown and inaccessible to us.
These are scary and unsettling thoughts, but it's very difficult to refute them. This is partly why Nietzsche continually stresses the importance of physiology (if he were alive today he'd be fascinated by genetics).
N.B. When I stress "mood-dependency" I certainly don't mean to affirm some fashionable egalitarian pomo nonsense. The underlying "mood" or "physiology", all those largely unconscious psychological, contextual, and biological factors that are omnipresent; although these are shaping factors in our words and deeds, they are NOT the whole story. There is also a world of hard, stubborn facts and constraints which play their part in determining what happens. A "mood" is always there, in one form or another, but it doesn't follow from this that therefore everything is determined and explicable as merely the expression of our "moods".
p.s. Quantum Theory and miracles:
I'm curious. If QT is being used to show that religious miracles are indeed conceivable because the laws of physics don't categorically rule them out, then they surely become, ipso facto, not really miracles at all!
A miracle is, by definition, a suspension of the laws of nature. But if the laws of nature themselves can account for an event, that even cannot any longer be considered a miracle. The event becomes, at best, a statistically unlikely occurrence, but no miracle. In short, I don't see how QT helps the religious here.
I don't see any reason to interpret P.429 other than it is. The type of person that P.427 finds incomprehensible and shocking, due to their practical indifference, is nowhere to be found in P.429. On the contrary, P.429 is "troubled", in a "pitiful state" and his "whole heart strains to know" the truth.
The "truth" being sought, I take it, is the nature of Christ. I don't think Pascal ever takes seriously the idea of a Godless universe. I think for him it's just obvious that a God exists. But I think it's equally clear that, for him, Deism, or a theistic religion without Jesus at its core and summit, is both useless and terrifying, even if it's true.
Of course, for every passage where Pascal displays anxiety and scepticism regarding Jesus and the hidden God, there are far more where he is clearly devoted to Jesus and embraces him as his only possible redeemer. That's not disputed.
Still, it is all the more significant, I think, that in spite of his heartfelt longing, devotion, affirmation and commitment, doubts, of a significant and agitating kind, still periodically surface.
The mood-dependency theory (if one can call it that) does make sense.
I think that, considering your comments, even if P. 429 were a "meditation" on the attitude of some searching nonbeliever, it would be based on Pascal's own experience. I can understand how he would fluctuate between confidence and doubt. It seems he does so elsewhere, so it's probable P. 429 is just another dubious episode. My initial interpretation of it may have been influenced taking his "devotional" passages as the only way he felt about himself and God. You say that "I think for Pascal it's just obvious that a God exists." If we interpret P. 429 as Pascal's own feelings and thoughts, then he did at least once NOT find the existence of a God obvious: "If I saw no sign there [in nature] of a Divinity I should decide on a negative solution: if I saw signs of a Creator everywhere I should peacefully settle down in the faith. But, seeing too much to deny and not enough to affirm, I am in a pitiful state. . . ."
Alvin Plantinga agrees that a miracle is a "suspension of natural law"--at least in Newtonian physics. But that's not all, because "In the Quantum view, God’s intervention in the natural world is even easier to understand, according to Plantinga. Indeed, since the best that we can do scientifically is to give probabilities as to what a system will do, God can act by 'forcing' a particular event to come true, regardless of how improbable" (http://blog.drwile.com/?p=4450). Miracles are suspensions of natural law and/or the "forcing" of merely improbable events. The latter might reduce miracles to the non-miraculous, but it still would be divine intervention. Although, there's no way to "prove" it was divine intervention, since it could have happened anyway.
I disagree. I think P.429 clearly states that, for Pascal, there is "too much to deny". i.e. A God of some sort, clearly exists. However, because he sees "not enough to affirm" , i.e. not enough to clearly see Christ behind the "hidden God" he is "in a pitiful state".
As he says elsewhere: "It is not only impossible but useless to know God without Christ" (emphasis added).
It's the "hidden God" that troubles him, not the possibility that there is no God, but the possibility that Jesus is not God, or, that he has insufficiently understood Jesus's message and meaning. That's the gnawing doubt that agitates him. It's the fact that, in the final analysis, it's the heart and not the head, that affirms Jesus, that there is no sublunar way of knowing, with absolute certainty, that the heart hasn't made a mistake.
Thinking back to the Catholic catechism and its claim that we need revelation to know certain things about God, and part of that revelation is supposedly the Bible, why say God is changeless if the Bible talks about God changing? The passages I thought of when you mentioned God changing would be the times he “changed his mind” because somebody prayed, or when he “repented” of creating mankind and started the flood as a result. I can’t think of an example wherein his character changed, or his nature changed (if you have one in mind, let me know—although what I’m about to say might apply to your example as well). Some people would say that the Bible talks about God from a human perspective, and therefore over-anthromoporphizes its descriptions of him. Talking of God changing his mind and whatnot are merely tools to telling the story. They shoudn’t be taken too literally or seriously. But, supposing that God can change his mind, does that mean he can change his character? I don’t think that follows necessarily, although some people may change their minds about who they are and thereby change their characters.
My point about the validation of self-sustaining love on atheism: Chemicals in the brain seem self-sustaining. The brain generally takes care of and regulates itself, although some people need to take pills. Presupposing that everything can be reduced to the physical world, love would probably just be chemicals in the brain that encourage “attachment” and all things associated with “love.” There is no need for some sort of external validation that there are chemicals in the brain or the brain sustains chemical reactions that go on in the body and in itself as well as it can. It has always been doing that whether we knew it or not. So, love could be self-sustaining if it were just chemical reactions.
I now see that my claim about “self-sustaining love” on theism that loved irrespective of belief in God was out of touch with orthodox Christian theism. Any sort of natural reflex of love would not be “true” love on Christianity. Its existence is compatible with Christianity, but it would be some sort of selfish, preferential love and incomplete.
I am undecided on the question of whether life without God existing is “worthless, meaningless and contemptible” or if that description is going too far. If God does exist, it’s hard to comprehend how any “evidence” would ever arise that his nonexistence entails this or that. There never would have been a time when he didn’t exist and we could compare reality when he doesn’t exist with reality when he does. So, it seems like a helpless question. If God does NOT exist, then the same thing seems to apply. We wouldn’t know exactly what kind of difference it really would make if he did exist. It would all be theoretical and abstract, guessing games. I might change my mind about it someday, though.
Good point on human circumstance and belief in God. Would you say that the existential types like Pascal are on to something or are they just spouting an emotional, unverifiable perspective of the world?
If it is to be argued that God either doesn't, or can't, change his "nature" or "character" we need to be clear what we mean by these terms.
I would have thought that since salvation itself is often concieved to be essentially dependent on God's grace, that, surely, is itself proof that we don't in fact know what God's "nature" and "character" is (in the relevant sense).
But I was thinking of things like "turn the other cheek" and "love those that hate you". These sentiments are out of step with the predominant spirit (no pun intended) of the OT. Numerous examples of inconsistency and contradiction, on fundamental points, abound in the Bible, so I won't bother listing them.
Also, by analogy: if a tree grows a new branch, is it still the same tree? If I have a new experience, am I still the same person I was prior to the experience? In short, I don't believe in essentialism.
Of course, God could still, if He wished, entertain the most contradictory and antithetical moods, behaviours and opinions, yet keep His status as God, as the most powerful, the most supreme being and architect of the whole cosmos. But if that's what's meant by God being "changeless" then it strikes me as highly pedantic and only trivially true.
As I said, I simply don't see the point of a revelation and a holy book if it isn't crystal clear to everyone how exactly such things are to be interpreted. And the de facto result of this reality is that it puts power in the hands of "mediators" and "intermediaries", i.e. priests, etc, who, as all history shows, frequently disagree on fundamental things.
Didn't God foresee that this would be the inevitable result of such methods? The whole thing makes no sense to me.
I don't know enough about the concrete details of Pascal's life (inner and outer) to make an informed guess with any great confidence. Dostoyevsky is another believer who I greatly respect. Both these figures, for all their differences, were astonishingly gifted, but both were also in a great deal of spiritual pain. Some of their pain I can understand.
Generalising enormously, i'd say that for any sensitive, educated and thoughtful person, life can be very difficult, and there is no shortage of factual "reasons" and "evidence" to "justify" pessimism or despair.
On the other hand, it is certainly not necessary, or inevitable or "natural" to succumb to pessimism or despair. Nor is there anything "Romantic" or picturesque about it.
Simplifying greatly, Nietzsche would say that serious pessimism or despair, in most circumstances, is, first and foremost, the symptom of an overly sensitive organism, and that questions about "intellectual, emotional justification" regarding the external facts of the world are virtually irrelevent. i.e When we feel something, that isn't the external world forcing an emotion onto us, it is an expression of our own physiological and psychological constitution.
Nietzsche often uses the analogy of our stomach's "digestive capacity". Some stomachs can readily accept and assimilate, without too much trouble or serious consequence, all manner of "unhealthy", foreign, tasteless things into it. This is a strong constitution.
Others, unfortunately, cannot successfully digest and assimilate certain substances, and because of this (objectively) weaker constitution, the closer they get to difficult, raw experience, the more they vomit, or go hungry.
Putting aside for the moment those statistically rare "existential" types, it is clear the religion is overwhelmingly a mass phenomenon, a public rather than an essentially private affair.
Accordingly, this may (or may not) interest you: it has long been observed that among modern "first world" countries the USA is, by far, the most (nominally) religious. Why?
Many theories have been offered but there is now growing sociological research that indicates that belief in God is highly correlated with societal dysfunction, and that religiosity is inversely proportionate to the "general health" of a population. i.e. Those counties with higher rates of violence, incarceration, income inequality, corruption, sexual diseases, the availability of health care, etc, are more religiously inclined.
I don't suggest that this research is yet conclusive, but it does, I think, point in the right direction towards more mundane, contingent and practical reasons why most people are (nominally) religious.
One of the things that's always struck me as significant is that the overwhelming majority of the religious who profess to "believe" actually have little or no idea about the details and genesis of their faith. Nor do they take any steps, their whole life long, to acquire any significant religious knowledge.
The point is that the majority of humanity has never been "religious" except as habit, tradition, custom, parental and peer-pressure, historical contingency (time and and place of birth and upbringing) and intellectual laziness. Almost none of them have seriously thought about the details of their faith, they merely parrot what's expected of them, with the minimum of fuss. The idea that God would be at all impressed with this kind of tokenistic affirmation has always struck me as absurd and blasphemous. Religion, to most (nominal) believers, is on a par with belief in the efficacy of lucky charms.
The point may seem rather obvious but it's no less significant for being so. All this would seem to suggest that, for most of humanity, religion has always been, ironically enough, an essentially practical and worldly affair, however much appearance suggested otherwise.
I don't really know what "nature" and "character" mean fundamentally. The best I can come up with is "what someone or something is similar to" or "what properties can we ascribe to that someone or something."
Could you explain why you find the doctrine of salvation by grace as "itself proof that we don't in fact know what God's 'nature' and 'character' is."
I understand by "turn the other cheek" that we aren't supposed to "get revenge" on people. I see this attitude even in the OT. Moses is slandered by his sister Miriam. God makes her into a leper, and then Moses begs God to heal her. Moses doesn't say, "Ha ha, Miriam, you got what you deserved" (even if she did deserve it). But, there was a time when David killed a messenger because the messenger claimed to have killed King Saul. That seems like a form of revenge in a way. So, the OT has a mixture of stories complying and contradicting the "turn the other cheek" attitude.
I might not fully understand your tree analogy, but it why couldn't the tree be the same after growing another branch? It is not suddenly a different species. The analogy does not seem conclusive to me.
By the changelessness of God, some just mean God is timeless. The only way for there to be change is if there's time, and if God is timeless, he can't change. Of course we have no way of knowing any of that. There are also some who do think God can change his mind etc (all of whom deduce this from reading the Bible). So, your point about the ambiguity of Scripture is well taken.
My example of people disagreeing on the "changelessness" of God supports your point that "the result of this reality is that it puts power in the hands of 'mediators' and 'intermediaries', i.e. priests, etc, who, as all history shows, frequently disagree on fundamental things." They do frequently disagree. But, the Catholic church is strongly against disagreement on fundamental things. Those who disagree with the Catholic church usually do not have solid reasons for interpreting Scripture the way they do. The Catholic church does as far as I have seen. So, the disagreements are not all equally viable and can be sorted through. The Catholic church claims that God DID foresee schisms and whatnot, and provided the Church as an "infallible interpreter" to guard against heresy. The "development of doctrine" over the centuries is supposed to serve as some form of evidence for this claim.
Nietzsche seems to be on the right track with his stomach analogy.
It's sadly true that many religious people are religious unreflectively. I also find that disturbing, especially since (thinking of Christians) the NT strongly advises (if it doesn't command) believers to "grow in knowledge" (2 Peter 1:5, 8). I have talked to people who seem to have the "unreflective" attitude and their reasons for being so are that to actually reflect on one's religion and try to "figure it all out" releases too much stress. It does, but that has only worldly connotations as you mention and provides no benefit in the "afterlife."
I think that the correlation between social dysfunction and belief in God could be interpreted as follows: Those who have a comfortable existence are overly satisfied with their worldly goods, whereas those who have an uncomfortable existence have come to see the futility of worldly goods etc., and therefore understand their "need for God." But, you could then interpret the latter case as people thinking, "I don't have the ability to be rich, therefore riches are futile." They have such a poor lot in this world that they think ahead "to the next," and the "rich" people are preoccupied with this world. But, you could say that poor people are religious just because that gives them a reason to be at peace with their lot in this life. I also don't know if these studies say so much about religion as they do about people. People like to use religion for their own selfish ends, rather than aiming to "serve God" (although that could be a selfish end, too).
a)Grace: I'm referring to the fact that no one can be sure they're going to heaven, which is another way of saying that the standard being applied by God is unknown to humanity. And because it's unknown, because it can't conform to any formal and explicit criterion we can recognise and articulate, this betrays the fact that we don't understand why God is choosing as he does. Ergo, we don't understand him at all!
2. Your Moses example won't work because it is not universalised, as it is in Jesus. Where in the OT does God ever tell humanity to love those that hate you, and turn the other cheek, always and forever, unconditionally?
3. Tree analogy: are you aware of Hume's conception of the self? See also Pensées.688. and think of the problem of God's supposedly 'unchanging nature' as you read it.
4. Catholicism's consistency on fundamental matter? Is Pensées.950., for example, part of this consistency?
5. Some of the most atheistic countries on earth are the Scandinavian nations, which, as far as I know, are not a hotbed of immorality, corruption and despair. The USA is significantly wealthier than these nations and has a very large middle class, so it isn't simply a question of internal economic disparity (i'm assuming here that many middle class Americans are also religious?).
But, as an atheist, I can't even begin to serve a God I don't believe in and can't possibly understand. Therefore what concerns me is the earth and the life and conduct of those in it. If the creator of the cosmos wants to impart some important information to me then i'm all ears, but the first task he'll have to accomplish to get me to seriously listen is to convince me that it is actually Him who is speaking. I see no evidence that this has ever, or will ever, occur.
In the words of Richard Feynman:"The stage is too big for the drama".
I think, deep down, many religious people know this. When Europe was most devoutly religious, and for most of the last two thousand years generally, illiteracy was the norm. Almost everyone was perfectly happy with this state of affairs, and saw no reason to change it. Even today, many of the most religious countries in the world have a strikingly high degree of illiteracy.
I conclude two important things from these facts:
1. The theocrats in power, while nominally proclaiming God's word, were intent on keeping it to themselves.
2. And, even more shockingly, the illiterate masses were largely content with this arrangement, and saw no need to demand that they acquire the skill necessary to read for themselves the words of the God they so unequivocally believed in.
This tells me that, in the profoundest and sincerest sense of the the word, the overwhelming majority of people have never been religious at all, no matter what appearances say to the contrary. And, as i've said previously, the idea that God in his omniscience would be unaware or unconcerned with this fact is, quite simply, ludicrous.
I don't think that the NT necessarily teaches the uncertainty of where we'll be in the afterlife. Jesus talks with certainty about ways people can "enter the kingdom of God" (Luke 18:18-25--unless whether we actually fulfill those requirements is uncertain, though Jesus no where says this). In the epistles, the apostle Paul at least sounds pretty sure that he's going to heaven (2 Cor. 4:17-18). The book of Hebrews warns against ways one can fail to attain heaven (deliberate sin), but it no where says "you still can't be sure where you'll end up even if you do fulfill all the requirements." I ultimately have to admit, though, despite the biblical "evidence," a person's temperament will be what influences his certainty of whether he's going to heaven or hell.
There are in fact commands relating to the attitude of "love your enemy" and "turn the other cheek" in the OT.
"Do not say, 'I will repay evil'; wait for the Lord, and he will deliver you" (Pro. 20:22).
"Do not say, 'I will do to him as he has done to me; I will pay the man back for what he has done'"(Pro. 24:29).
"It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth. Let him sit alone in silence when it is laid on him; let him put his mouth in the dust—there may yet be hope; let him give his cheek to the one who strikes, and let him be filled with insults" (Lam. 3:27-30).
"If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink, for you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you" (Pro. 25:21-22).
"'If you meet your enemy's ox or his donkey going astray, you shall bring it back to him. If you see the donkey of one who hates you lying down under its burden, you shall refrain from leaving him with it; you shall rescue it with him'" (Exo. 23:4-5).
I am ignoring all concrete examples in the OT of characters obeying what they are told here and/or disobeying it.
If you are thinking of the verse "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" (Lev 24:20), that is not meant to apply to personal relationships with other people (for example, a brother is eats his sister's candy because she ate his), rather it is a standard for judges to use when sentencing judgment on criminals. That doesn't mean the verse hasn't been twisted to apply to personal relationships, but that is in conflict with other biblical verses that do more evidently apply to personal relationships (which I have cited above).
Also, I don't think "turn the other cheek" is unconditional. That principle doesn't mean parents shouldn't discipline their kids. For example, in Mat. 18:15-17, Jesus clearly is not advocating a "turn the other cheek" ethic:
"If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established pby the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector."
I was not aware of Hume's concept of the self. I looked it up and am guessing you mean "the bundle theory of the self." I understand the analogy now in light of that. Are you saying that, given Hume's concept of the self, God doesn't even have an underlying "nature"?
I think I spoke too soon on Catholicism's consistency and agreement on fundamental matter. Technically, any religion is "consistent" on fundamental matter since no religion randomly changes its fundamentals, but maintains its principles. It's the adherents of the religion who change. Catholics have obviously changed their minds. Martin Luther is an example. None of which scores points for Catholicism.
Your point about the apparent irrelevance of "economic disparity" and religion isn't one I thought of before. Most middle class Americans, are religious. They aren't, as far as I have seen, as fervently religious as those in poorer countries, though.
You earlier mentioned how we can't know God's reasons for his choices, and "ergo, we can't understand him at all!" Well, I don't know whether you agree with Pascal here, but he says (from the perspective of a person failing to look for truth), "'I do not know who put me into the world, nor what the world is, nor what I am myself. I am terribly ignorant about everything. I do not know what my body is, or my sense, or my soul, or even that part of me which thinks what I am saying, which reflects about everything and about itself, and does not know itself any better than it knows anything else'" (P 427). Basically, we humans barely understand ourselves (if at all), so whether we can understand God or not should not be anymore of a problem than it is for us to understand ourselves.
What, to you, would constitute evidence that God is behind any communication?
It wasn't until Luther translated the Bible into German (although I think there were some English translators of the Bible before Luther) that the illiterate masses became interested in reading it. It was illegal to translate the Bible (which supports point 1.) and that may have influenced the people to keep their interests in reading (if they had any) out of sight. When the printing press came along, the masses had more access to books--or they may have been too expensive--and there was a point to becoming literate. The reasons behind the theocrats keeping God's word to themselves was supposedly to prevent heresy. Interestingly, once the laymen got to read the Bible for themselves, thousands of denominations resulted (not all at once, though). They were "afraid for men's souls." Now you might point out that is a superficial cover for power, and maybe so, but it doesn't therefore seem like an illegitimate cover. I must concede though that the Church could have gotten along fine without keeping the Bible to themselves, since the ancient Christians had Scriptures in their own homes. Of course, none of this applies to illiterate countries today.
Overall, though, I don't understand why this means the "majority of people have never been religious."
I'm simply not familiar enough with the Bible to offer any informed response to the passages you cite. I would need to have a very specific understanding of context and attribution before I responded with any confidence to these passages, so i'm afraid i'll have to remain silent here.
I'm aware that, for example, 'The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs', written 109-107b.c., contains several passages that sound very close to what Jesus (in his most pacifistic and loving form) was advocating.
However, for me, to state the obvious, Jesus is not divine and the Gospels are not, and cannot be, accurate representations of the man called Jesus. Although I believe that behind and underneath these later accretions a real historical figure (Jesus) actually existed, I have no way of separating fact from fiction, regarding the words, acts and events of Jesus's life.
What this means is that, for me personally, the word "Jesus" represents an exemplary kind of historical "good man". This is essentially a free creation of my mind, it is not grounded in credible evidence, whether historical or textual. It's an image, a visceral archetype, in my head, in the same lazy way that the words "Hitler" and "Attila the Hun" represent certain kinds of barbarity, in my head.
In a nutshell, the "bad" things attributed to Jesus (e.g. the fig tree, the swine hurtling over the cliff, the damned receiving judgement) I simply treat as fictions; and I treat only the "good" things (e.g. love one another) as belonging to Jesus "proper".
Now why, you may reasonably ask, do I operate according to this overtly self-selecting, almost childish and arbitrary principle?
Answer: because if Jesus was actually otherwise, and the things I consider "bad" can be authentically attributed to him, then I have no interest in him whatsoever (because, for me, he is no longer a worthy symbol of an exemplary kind of human being).
Hume etc: I wouldn't say that God (as a concept) couldn't have an "underlying nature", because for God perhaps all things are possible; how can we possibly know?
But, I am saying that if God does have a unitary, fixed, eternal "nature" it would be impossible for us to identify it and recognise it, because all we can ever see/experience/conceive is God's qualities, God's actions, God's attributes (whatever they may be), and we would find it impossible (I would argue) to identify some unconditionally changeless substratum beneath and behind all of these things.
God's status, as the supreme being, may be an eternal, unchanging fact, but status is not to be confused with God's "nature". In trying to identify God's nature we run into the same problems that Hume (and others such as Nietzsche with his critique of the concept 'Subject') identified in regard to ourselves.
If we try and imagine God shorn of all his actions (i'm conceiving his "thoughts" and "feelings" as types of actions), what remains over? What is left that we are calling "God"? What is God's "nature" in the absence of any actions?
And if God's nature is determined by his actions, is in fact constituted by them, and his actions are manifold and various, then it would seem to follow that his "nature" is neither static nor dualistic.
From my paltry human perspective, I don't see how "proof" of anything whatsoever is even possible. This is an embarrassing epistemological problem that philosophy has never been able to solve.
Consequently, I can't see how God could ever prove (conclusively, definitively, absolutely, without the slightest possible trace of doubt) to us, or even to himself, that he was, in fact, God.
But, because humanity can't fathom a way out of this epistemic abyss doesn't necessarily mean that a way doesn't exist. Perhaps there is a way God could offer proof of his existence, who can say?
If we then forgo absolute certainty as a hopeless quest and rest content with affirming something with an extraordinarily high degree of probability, would very strong "evidence" be possible for God? What would convince me, practically speaking?
Many people have pondered this question and it has provoked many responses among atheists.
If, for example, the laws of physics appear to have been broken in a very explicit and incomprehensible manner, so that, for example, a piece of text, or a booming voice were to appear in the sky, simultaneously to every human on the earth, in every appropriate language, proclaiming religion X and subsequently answering every intelligent and profound question it was asked to everyone's satisfaction - would that be evidence enough for God?
Practically speaking, I think I personally would accept it as authentic. However, it could simply be a hoax carried out by an alien civilisation far superior to our own, and there would be no conclusive way of ruling this possibility out completely. But, as I say, practically speaking, yes, I would believe.
Others have speculated that God may have signed his name (in the appropriate language) in every atom, or perhaps every gene etc. Again, practically speaking, i'm pretty sure I would accept it, even though I couldn't rule out the alien hoax possibility.
Many more scenarios can be imagined as candidates. But, in the final analysis, demonstrations of vast power would render me obedient but wouldn't be very persuasive. What I would want, more than anything else, were reasons, explanations, answers, coupled with a willingness to listen.
But every sophisticated conception of theology that i'm aware of makes clear that God (in his inscrutable omniscience) doesn't want to be known in such a fashion (a very convenient doctrine).
Lest the most important thing go unsaid: whether there's a God or not, in my view, is not the most important question. The supreme questions is: Is there a God who cares?
Imagine the unparalleled despair, terror and anxiety if it was proved true that there was indeed a God, but that He wasn't at all concerned with our well-being? Who would draw comfort from such a momentous discovery?
I'm principally an atheist, not because I think the concept of a God is incoherent or indemonstrable in Nature (it isn't), but because a God-who-cares is.
No one denies that countless millions of people are (nominally) very religious, and that their consciousness has been dominated by religious allegiance of one sort or another, as well as their behaviour.
The fact that almost every "religious" person acquires their religiosity via chance, circumstance, geography, parentage, peer-pressure, historical location, and various other clearly contingent factors is almost never addressed by believers. For the vast majority, their religiosity is not, and never has been, the result of a hard-won spiritual and dialectical struggle, no serious soul-searching ever takes place, no serious evidenciary and epistemic problems are ever encountered (or if encountered are quickly overcome), and no sustained engagements with critical points of view are sought.
If religion is viewed primarily as a sociological or political or cultural phenomenon (usually corresponding, historically, to some pre-existing in-group / out-group dynamic), then religion is indeed a mass phenomenon.
But what about the content, intelligibility and epistemic status of the the doctrines that supposedly lie at the very core of a faith? These are supposed to be the hallmarks of our encounter with the Divine, the content that legitimises all our subsequent words and behaviours, and yet, almost no one (statistically speaking) applies any significant time or energy in exploring these things.
People put their trust in the judgements of their peers or religious intermediaries, again, without spending any significant time and energy in establishing the probity of these interpreters. Apparently, these people must think that God isn't overly concerned with the content of your actual beliefs, or the effort you've put in to acquiring your beliefs; he's content to forgive you for letting others (who He has not personally authorised) do your thinking for you, and if, as a consequence, you get many things totally wrong, well, it's no big deal.
This is a very strange conception of God, a God who is concerned with interpretive hierarchy and group cohesion, but is fine with individual laziness, obedience, gullibility and docility.
All this merely demonstrates that organised religion is overwhelmingly a sociological phenomenon, a power centre characterised by ignorance among the general population and a thirst for power among the interpreters.
I can't accept the "heresy" argument. Almost all dogma (of any kind) began as heresy, and "orthodoxy" is merely a resulting equilibrium that arises after earlier power struggles over interpretation. (see, for example The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition, a scholarly work by Jaroslav Pelikan 1971).
Are we to believe that the masses themselves didn't want to educate themselves in order to be able to take responsibility for their beliefs? If so, it's not to God's credit that he's happy to embrace such "believers".
In the case of the elite themselves: if the masses are to be treated like children and told what to believe, why did Jesus waste so much time conversing with them? Why is there no record in the Gospels of Jesus conversing with sophisticated theologians and moral philosophers, outlining in minute detail the resolution to every conceivable theological quarrel? Why didn't Jesus do theology and metaphysics? This would give the subsequent interpreters a solid foundation from which to proceed in relating to the ignorant and obedient masses.
I only ask these questions rhetorically. Organised, doctrinal religion is the invention of a priestly class, with the uncomprehending approval of the unknowing masses. Once you accept that, all the obscurantism is essentially explained.
My apologies - my view on these matters, though sincere, is unworthy of future discussion, and benifits neither of us.
One important thing that I have so far failed to mention in relation to Pascal's Pensées is that certain very obvious questions are strikingly missing from it - in particular the "problem of evil", as regards the human species, and, more generally, the issue of animal suffering that, numerically at least, dwarfs all human suffering.
It is hard to explain this deafening silence on Pascals' part, given how sensitive and alert he was regarding suffering. And this leads me to suspect that he was in flight from his own intellectual conscience on this question, a question that any genuine moralist cannot fail to be aware of.
The God that Pascal (and every other 'good' person) wants to believe in is, among other things, a God who loves and cares for his creations. How this longing is to be reconciled with the suffering endured by the countless innocent infants among the human species has never been made satisfactorily clear by any theologian. Didn't Pascal see any difficulty here? Why did he choose to stay well away from this heartrending question?
And similarly, why is he silent on the immense suffering routinely endured by so many of the other species on this planet? The sheer scale of this perpetual agony staggers the mind, but, if we are trying to make sense of existence in moral terms, as virtually all religious people claim, then i'm afraid that this commonplace horror and suffering calls out for an explanation. Or, if explanation is too ambitious a request, at least a serious response is required. Pascal, i'm afraid, has no response at all.
My apologies if I seem morbid and overly bleak here by highlighting these ugly facts, but in the final analysis, we are either serious about these questions or we are not, and if we are, we have no moral right to ignore them.
The following video clip gives a hint of the immense squandering and suffering that many trillions of animals have endured, and, unlike the human adult, we can't simply evade their suffering by saying that God gave them free will and the capacity to choose good but, against all wisdom and morality and opportunity, they perversely chose evil. Animals don't have that choice, they are innocence personified.
WARNING! This clip shows Golden Eagle's killing young goats by dragging them off a high cliff to their death. Anyone especially sensitive or vulnerable to nihilistic despair is advised not to watch it. It is horrific and heartbreakingly sad.
It seems to me that Pascal was possibly planning on addressing the problem of evil based on notes in his Pensées. First of all, he often mentions the "corruption of nature" (P. 6), which might include animal suffering. He talks about man the monster (P. 130), so I suspect free will (or just "choice") being a cause of evil is something he had in mind. I don't think he was avoiding the problem of evil because it was something he couldn't explain satisfactorily. He may have thought he had a "satisfactory" answer but didn't think the problem of evil was important enough to mention in detail. I have in the past dismissed the problem of evil as "not a big deal" (and I thought it was easily answered by William Lane Craig). Pascal was probably not as superficial as me, but I can see the possibility that he just didn't take the problem of evil "seriously."
I watched the video, and I couldn't help notice that the other goats who witnessed the death of those killed did not seem too disturbed or at least as upset as many humans are at the sight of these things. They just tried to chase the eagle away, to keep themselves from getting killed as well. They don't appear traumatized or bothered. I know some animals may be upset by the death of a mate or children. Most animals don't appear to care a great deal though, and get over their loss quickly (unless I'm over-generalizing here).
There is a response by Michael Murray in his book "Nature Red in Tooth and Claw" to the problem of animal suffering. Here is a highly condensed version of one of his answers:
"A second (though unpopular) response to this problem is to deny that animal pain and suffering is real or morally relevant. Most will react to this response with incredulity: 'Isn’t it just obvious that some animals experience pain and suffering?' The answer to that question is yes and no. We do think it an item of common sense that animals experience pain and suffering. But the scientific evidence for this is not as strong as you might think. Of course, scientists all acknowledge that many animals display behaviors that make it look like they are in pain. But that is not good enough. To see why, consider the phenomenon of 'blindsight.' Patients with blindsight claim to be blind, and yet are at the same time able to point to objects and, in some cases, catch balls--something they could only do if they could in fact see. So are they blind or not? Well, it depends on what you mean by 'sight.' They can see in the sense that they can use visual information to regulate their behavior. But they are not consciously aware of the fact that they can do this.
When it comes to pain, then, the question is: might the behaviors that we associate with animals that look to be in pain constitute something like 'blindpain'--showing all the behavioral symptoms of real pain, but without the conscious awareness? Amazingly, given what we know about the functioning of the brain, the answer might be yes. Those parts of the brain most closely associated with consciousness of pain, are also the parts that were the last to arrive among mammals: the pre-frontal cortex" (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/animal-suffering1#ixzz2OnFJaEXD).
The definition of the pre-frontal cortex and what sort of creatures have it is actually debated, so I doubt that Murray's claim at the end is totally sound.
What would constitute a "serious response" to the problem of evil for you? Free will? "Corrupt" nature (as Pascal leans toward)?
The problem of evil can only be avoided or "answered" (within a theistic perspective) if you subscribe to the view that the God you worship is, above all, a God of power. In which case, all praise and admiration of God is nothing other than prudent obedience to a being who can harm or reward you according to his own arbitrary will.
I find that a thoroughly horrific, hopeless, unnecessary, masochistic and deeply misanthropic attitude. I would go as far as to suggest that all this is really just an elaboration and development of primitive folk religions and fertility cults, and is the result of either scientific ignorance or an unwillingness to understand the natural world as it is.
I'm sorry, but the Murray quotation is simply absurd.
A "serious response" would have two aspects. Firstly, it would have to have a genuinely visceral and sympathetic aspect in confronting the immense horror involved (something WLC evidently lacks). Dostoyevsky is the most powerful writer i'm aware of on this point.
Secondly, a "serious response" would have to demonstrate a high degree of conceptual sophistication, but without any obscurantism.
N.B. A "serious response" is not the same thing as an adequate and coherent answer and solution. A "serious response" only shows that the subject is being taken seriously and that the attempt is worthy, on moral and intellectual grounds, of being critiqued.
The (theological) problem of evil persists because most believers simultaneously affirm two antithetical and irreconcilable viewpoints: God is omnipotent and God is loving. These two axioms are groundless, and without any supporting credible evidence (empirically and conceptually). But, groundless though they are, believers want to believe them, and in desperately trying to reconcile the irreconcilable they are often forced to abandon all logic and human sympathy.
This is not a serious intellectual problem at all, it's primarily a problem of psychology and sociology. It would be like having contemporary alchemists. Their axioms are so wrong-headed that no amount of education in molecular chemistry is likely to have much of an effect. They are alchemists for reasons that have nothing to do with chemistry.
What do you mean by "conceptual sophistication"? Do you know of any responses to the problem of evil that fulfill the two aspects you mention (perhaps Dostoyevsky)?
What are your specific reasons for viewing the existence of evil as incompatible with a loving, omnipotent God? It seems that when we talked about this in the past, we just took it as given that no loving God would allow evil, but I'm beginning to question that.
Dostoyevsky's engagement is heartfelt and brutal, and for this I give him great (moral) credit. His "answer", as far as i'm aware, is visceral and ineffable. In a less sensitive and honest writer this would be, I think, an appaling dereliction of moral duty. As I said, Dostoyevsky engages with the question, but doesn't pretend to resolve it. He can't resolve it, no one can (unless, of course, one understands the concepts of good and evil as depending entirely on God's arbitrary will).
As i've said, I don't see this question as a serious intellectual problem at all. In no other sphere of life do educated adults behave this way.
There are problems that may be solved, or intelligently addressed, by a priori reasoning, and those that can be solved or addressed by empiricism. The idea of an omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent God defies all logic and all evidence, and it's only psychology and sociology that keeps (for some people) the question alive.
I can't think of any other subject where otherwise reasonable and educated adults continue to investigate a subject which has neither logic nor evidence in its favor.
I don't think I have anything new or significant to say on this subject. Anything I said would just be a restatement or elaboration of things i've already said. For me it's a non-issue. The question of "evil" is an existential and practical question of great importance, but for me it's not a theological question at all. It's a question entirely of this world, and trying to make sense of it by reference to some other, transcendent, indemonstrable, inaccessible world is a distraction.
I think Pascal occupies a very privileged place in Nietzsche's imagination. He sees Pascal, Schopenhauer and himself as "evolutionary" connected in a profound way. Yet it's very noticeable how rarely (if ever) Pascal is mentioned by most contemporary "Nietzschean" academics who are professionally occupied with Nietzsche (see e.g.BGE.58).
ReplyDeleteThe seriousness and respect with which Nietzsche treats Pascal (I think a strong textual case could be made for arguing that Pascal is, actually, the individual Christian Nietzsche respects most) is in sharp contrast to the frequently expressed disdain, contempt, and despair he feels for most atheistic "free thinkers" (a fact conveniently overlooked by most "Nietzschean" academics).
In a future post I will briefly outline some important points of contact between these two men (any interested reader should acquire Pascal's "Pensées").
I should say, for anyone unfamiliar with Pascal, that, although very different from Nietzsche in many ways, he is every bit as serious. Something as rare as it is significant.
ReplyDeleteAnyway, some important points of conceptual contact between the two, are:
Might is Right. There is no true "justice" to be discovered.
The inescapability of self-love in all our actions.
That our affects often (or always?) determine our thinking.
Hence, that reason can, as Pascal often says "be bent in any direction".
That life is essentially horrific.
That the overwhelming majority of people (including the educated) have no significant "existential" dilemmas.
Scepticism regarding the "self". Here Pascal is profound, but tentative, it's not something he emphasises. With Nietzsche, of course, the notion of the "subject" is frequently critiqued.
That our thoughts come from we know not where (or why); that we don't will what appears in our consciousness.
That the existence or absence of God is of supreme importance.
Hi david,
ReplyDeletei haven't read any Pascal myself, but i did come across a piece by Ken Gemes on 'Nietzsche On Truth' where he says that Nietzsche's example of Pascal as a great man ruined by Christianity is "implausible". Gemes seems to see things the other way around, and argues that it was precisely by taking Christianity so very seriously that Pascal's thought became extraordinary at all.
Welcome Lucy,
ReplyDeleteYes, i've read the essay you cite. As you'll know, Gemes offers this opinion only in a footnote, and offers no evidence whatsoever to support it. Given the importance of the subject for Nietzsche (and, one would have thought, Nietzsche scholars) it's astonishing that the subject is almost never seriously explored!
I couldn't disagree more with Gemes on this, but, given the extremely flimsy nature of his remark, it's difficult to take seriously.
p.s. I do agree with Gemes, however, in thinking that, relatively speaking, Nietzsche was little interested in "truth" (as traditionally conceived by epistemologists).
In WP.424 Nietzsche writes: "The profoundest and least exhausted books will probably always have something of the aphoristic and unexpected character of Pascal's Pensées."
ReplyDeleteHow often does Nietzsche ever lavish such praise on the work of atheistic authors? Almost never. How often does Nietzsche ever lavish such praise on the work of theists or deists? Again, almost never. Why then does Nietzsche consider this work of Pascal to be among the "profoundest and least exhausted" books ever written and perhaps a model of all future books deserving this high praise?
Pascal was already, before his religious awakening, a polymath, his extraordinary genius evident in a number of fields. But both Pascal and Nietzsche were agreed that none of this, however intellectually dazzling, constituted "profundity". Pensées is profound because it won't cohere as a whole, because the parts are in conflict, and the reason why the parts are in conflict is that Pascal is driven by two contradictory things: the will to truth and the will to see Christ as saviour. Pascal's deepest hope was that there was no real conflict here, but his frequently displayed ruthless honesty entailed that numerous passages surfaced which simply don't lend themselves to an edifying Christian perspective.
In what follows I will not be faithful to Pensées as a whole and Pascal's intention. I will largely ignore the numerous passages where Pascal makes clear his devotion to Christ and I will largely ignore these passages because I find none of them convincing. Pascal's horror, despair and nausea at existence is very explicit in this work, and his flight towards Christ is largely a flight away from this existential terror.
Nevertheless, Pascal remains one of my favourite and most respected writers, a thinker far superior, and far more honest and insightful, than most atheist thinkers (including most so-called "Nietzsche scholars", who simply lack solitude).
I ask the reader to keep the following thought in mind throughout this entire thread: Pascal, Schopenhauer and Nietzsche represent three important responses to existence, and Pascal and Schopenhauer represent, for Nietzsche, two temptations that he is determined to overcome and move beyond. Pascal cannot affirm the world as it is without Christ; Schopenhauer cannot affirm the Godless universe and so advocates a pessimism of passivity and renunciation; while Nietzsche's whole project, by contrast, was determined to find an affirmative way out of this nihilistic abyss.
However, it is crucial to appreciate that the nihilistic abyss is real, and that those who understand this and feel it within themselves are far more related to Nietzsche's project than the countless so-called "free-thinkers" who now surround us. The typical "free-thinker", as Nietzsche long ago recognised, is not an ally but an opponent and obstacle in this project of self-overcoming, for they have nothing especially terrible, ugly and horrific to overcome. Such people are, understandably, looking forward to the arrival of the Last Man.
I will spend the next few posts quoting Pascal on some subjects of importance to Nietzsche. It should soon become apparent why Nietzsche held Pascal in such high regard.
Some remarks on the relationship between Might and Right.
ReplyDelete"Of true justice. We no longer have any. If we had, we should not accept it as a rule of justice that one should follow the customs of one's country. That is why we have found might when we could not find right." (P.86).
"Three degrees of latitude upset the whole of jurisprudence and one meridian determines what is true. Basic laws change when they have been in force only a few years, law has its periods, the entry of Saturn into the house of the Lion marks the origin of a given crime. It is a funny sort of justice whose limits are marked by a river; true on this side of the Pyrenees, false on the other.
They confess that justice does not lie in these customs, but resides in natural laws common to every country. They would certainly maintain this obstinately if the reckless chance which distributed human laws had struck on just one which was universal, but the joke is that man's whims have shown such great variety that there is no such case.
Larceny, incest, infanticide, parricide, everything has at some time been accounted a virtuous action . . . The result of this confusion is that one man says that the essence of justice is in the authority of the legislator, another the convenience of the sovereign, another present custom, and that is most reliable. Merely according to reason, nothing is just in itself, everything shifts with time. Custom is the whole of equity for the sole reason that it is accepted. That is the mystic basis of its authority. Anyone who tries to bring it back to its first principles destroys it. Nothing is so defective as those laws which correct defects. Anyone obeying them because they are just is obeying an imaginary justice, not the essence of the law, which is completely self-contained: it is law and nothing more. Anyone wishing to examine the reason for this will find it so trivial and feeble . . . that he will be amazed that in a century it has acquired so much pomp and reverence. The art of subversion, of revolution, is to dislodge established customs by probing down to their origins in order to show how they lack authority and justice. There must, they say, be a return to the basic and primitive laws of the state which unjust custom has abolished. There is no surer way to lose everything: nothing will be just if weighed in these scales . . . The truth about the usurpation must not be made apparent; it came about originally without reason and has become reasonable." (P.59).
" . . . the injustice of our masters is not corrected by being pointed out . . ." (P.847).
"The bonds securing men's mutual respect are generally bonds of necessity, for there must be differences of degree, since all men want to be on top and all cannot be, but some can. Imagine, then, that we can see them beginning to take shape. It is quite certain that men will fight until the stronger oppresses the weaker, and there is finally one party on top. But, once this has been settled, then the masters, who do not want the war to go on, ordain that the power which is in their hands shall pass down by whatever means they like; some entrust it to popular suffrage, others to hereditary succession, etc.
And this is where imagination begins to play its part. Until then pure power did it, now it is power, maintained by imagination in a certain fraction . . . " (P.828).
"Power rules the world, not opinion, but it is opinion that exploits power. It is power that makes opinion." (P.554).
"The greatest and most important thing in the world is founded on weakness. This is a remarkably sure foundation, for nothing is surer than that the people will be weak. Anything founded on sound reason is very ill-founded, like respect for wisdom." (P.26).
ReplyDelete"Right without might is helpless, might without right is tyrannical. Right without might is challenged, because there are always evil men about . . . Right is open to dispute, might is easily recognised and beyond dispute. Therefore right could not be made mighty because might challenged right calling it unjust and itself claiming to be just. Thus being unable to make right into might, we have made might into right." (P.103).
"If it had been possible, men would have put might into the hands of right, but we cannot handle might as we like, since it is a palpable quality, whereas right is a spiritual quality which we manipulate at will, and so right has been put into the hands of might." (P.85).
Some remarks on Self-love, vanity etc.
ReplyDelete"Self-love. The nature of self-love and of this human self is to love only self and consider only self. But what is it to do? It cannot prevent the object of its love from being full of faults and wretchedness: it wants to be great and sees that it is small; it wants to be happy and sees that it is wretched . . . The predicament in which it finds itself arouses in it the most unjust and criminal passion that could possibly be imagined, for it conceives a deadly hatred for the truth which rebukes it and convinces it of its faults. It would like to do away with this truth . . . We ought not to be annoyed that they [i.e. other people] know them [our faults] and despise us, because it is right that they should know us for what we are and despise us if we are despicable.
These are the feelings which would spring from a heart full of equity and justice. What then should we say of ours, seeing it is quite differently disposed? For is it not true that we hate the truth and those who tell it to us, and we would like them to be deceived to our advantage, and we want to be esteemed by them as other than we actually are? . . . This aversion for the truth exists in differing degrees, but it may be said that it exists in everyone to some degree, because it is inseparable from self-love.
It is this false delicacy which makes those who have to correct others choose so many devious ways and qualifications to avoid giving offence. They must minimize our faults, pretend to excuse them and combine this with praise and marks of affection and esteem. Even such medicine still tastes bitter to self-love, which takes as little of it as possible. always with disgust and often even with secret resentment against those administering it. The result is that anyone who has an interest in winning our affection avoids rendering us a service which he knows to be unwelcome . . . we like being deceived and we are deceived.
This is why each rung of fortune's ladder which brings us up in the world takes us further from the truth, because people are more wary of offending those whose friendship is most useful and enmity most dangerous. A prince can be the laughing-stock of Europe and the only one to know nothing about it. This does not surprise me . . .[Now] those who live with princes prefer their own interests to that of the prince they serve, and so they have no wish to benefit him by harming themselves . . . [but] more modest people are not exempt, because we always have some interest in being popular. This human life is a nothing but a perpetual illusion: there is nothing but mutual deception and flattery.
No one talks about us in our presence as he would in our absence. Human relationships are only based on this mutual deception; and few friendships would survive if everyone knew what his friend said about him behind his back, even though he spoke sincerely and dispassionately. Man is therefore nothing but disguise, falsehood, hypocricy, both in himself and with regards to others. He does not want to be told the truth. He avoids telling it to others, and all these tendencies, so remote from justice and reason, are naturally rooted in his heart" (P.978).
"It is untrue that we are worthy to be loved by others. It is unfair that we should want such a thing. If we were born reasonable and impartial, with a knowledge of ourselves and others, we should not give our wills this bias. However, we are born with it, and so we are born unfair. For everything tends towards itself . . . " (P.421).
ReplyDelete"All men seek happiness. There are no exceptions. However different the means they may employ, they all strive towards this goal. The reason why some go to war and some do not is the same desire in both, but interpreted in two different ways. The will never takes the least step except to that end. This is the motive force of every act of every man, including those who go and hang themselves" (P.148).
"The ordinary life of men is like that of saints. They all seek satisfaction, and differ only according to the objects in which they locate it. Those they call their enemies are those that prevent them etc."(P.275).
"Talk about humility gives occasion for pride to the proud and humility to the humble. Similarly, sceptical arguments allow the positive to be positive. Few speak humbly of humility, chastely of chastity, dubiously of scepticism. We are nothing but lie, duplicity, contradiction, and we hide and disguise ourselves from ourselves" (P.655).
"We do not keep ourselves virtuous by our own power, but by the counterbalance of two opposing vices, just as we stay upright between two contrary winds. Take one of these vices away and we fall into the other" (P.674).
"Pity for the unfortunate does not run counter to concupiscence; on the contrary, we are very glad to show such evidence of friendship and thus to win a reputation for sympathy without giving anything in return" (P.657).
"We do not care about our reputation in towns where we are only passing through. But when we have to stay some time we do care. How much time does it take? A time proportionate to our vain and paltry existence." (P.31).
"How vain painting is, exiting admiration by its resemblance to things of which we do not admire in the originals!"(P.40)
"There is no better proof of human vanity than to consider the causes and effects of love, because the whole universe can be changed by it. Cleopatra's nose."(P.197).
The SELF.
ReplyDelete"What is the self? . . . But what about a person who loves someone for the sake of her beauty; does he love her? No, for smallpox, which will destroy beauty without destroying the person, will put an end to his love for her. And if someone loves me for my judgement or my memory, do they love me? me, myself? No, for I could lose those qualities without losing my self. Where then is this self, if it is neither in the body nor the soul? And how can one love the body or the soul except for the sake of such qualities, which are not what makes up the self, since they are perishable? Would we love the substance of a person's soul, in the abstract, whatever qualities might be in it? That is not possible, and it would be wrong. Therefore we never love anyone, but only qualities." (P.688).
General Method.
"Scepticism. I will write down my thoughts here as they come and in perhaps a not aimless confusion. This is the true order and it will always show my aim by its very disorder. I should be honouring my subject too much if I treated it in order, since I am trying to show that it is incapable of it". (P.532).
"Thoughts come at random and go at random. No device for holding on to them or for having them. A thought has escaped: I was trying to write it down: instead I write down that it has escaped me" (P.542).(cf.BGE.17).
The abyss.
ReplyDelete"I maintain that, if everyone knew what others said about him, there would not be four friends in the world . . . " (P.792).
"Contempt for our existence, dying for nothing, hatred of our existence" (P.123).
"Man's greatness comes from knowing he is wretched: a tree does not know it is wretched. Thus it is wretched to know that one is wretched, but there is greatness in knowing one is wretched" (P.114).
"Imagine a number of men in chains, all under sentence of death, some of whom are each day butchered in the sight of the others; those remaining see their own condition in that of their fellows, and looking at each other with grief and despair await their turn. This is an image of the human condition." (P.434).
"This is what I see and what troubles me. I look around in every direction and all I see is darkness. Nature has nothing to offer me that does not give me rise to doubt and anxiety. If I saw no sign there of a Divinity I should decide on a negative solution: if I saw signs of a Creator everywhere I should peacefully settle down in the faith. But, seeing too much to deny and not enough to affirm, I am in a pitiful state, where I have wished a hundred times that, if there is a God supporting nature, she should unequivocally proclaim him, and that, if the signs in nature are deceptive, they should be completely erased; that nature should say all or nothing so that I could see what course I ought to follow. Instead of that . . . I know neither my condition, nor my duty. My whole heart strains to know what the true good is in order to pursue it: no price would be too high to pay for eternity. I envy those of the faithful whom I see living so unconcernedly, making so little use of a gift which, it seems to me, I should turn to such different account." (P.429).
"When I see the blind and wretched state of man, when I survey the whole universe in its dumbness and man left to himself with no light . . . I am moved to terror, like a man transported in his sleep to some terrifying desert island, who wakes up quite lost and with no means of escape. Then I marvel that so wretched a state does not drive people to despair. I see other people around me, made like myself. I ask them if they are any better informed than I, and they say that they are not. (P.198).
"Man is only a reed, the weakest in nature but he is a thinking reed. There is no need for the whole universe to take up arms to crush him: a vapour, a drop of water is enough to kill him. But even if the universe were to crush him, man would still be nobler than his slayer, because he knows that he is dying and the advantage the universe has over him. The universe knows none of this. Thus all our dignity consists in thought. (P.200).
"Men are wholly occupied in pursuing their good, but they cannot justify their claim to possession nor have they the
strength to make possession secure. It is the same with knowledge and pleasures. We posses neither truth nor good" (P.890).
Truth, reason, scepticism etc.
ReplyDelete"All our reasoning comes down to surrendering to feeling . . . reason is available but can be bent in any direction. And so there is no rule" (P.530).
"The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing. . ."(P.423).
"It may be that there are such things as true proofs, but it is not certain. Thus that only proves that it is not certain that everything is uncertain. To the greater glory of scepticism". (P.521).
"Reason's last step is the recognition that there are an infinite number of things which are beyond it. It is merely feeble if it does not go so far as to realise that. " (P.188).
"Imagination. It is the dominant faculty in man, master of error and falsehood, all the more deceptive for not being invariably so; for it would be an infallible criterion of truth if it were infallibly that of lies. Since, however, it is usually false, it gives no indication of its quality, setting the same mark on true and false alike. I am not speaking of fools, but of the wisest men, among whom imagination is best entitled to persuade. Reason may object in vain, it cannot fix the price of things." (P.44).
"The strongest of the sceptics' arguments, to say nothing of minor points, is that we cannot be sure that these principles are true (faith and revelation apart) except through some natural intuition. Now this natural intuition affords no convincing proof that they are true. There is no certainty . . . Moreover, no one can be sure, apart from faith, whether he is sleeping or waking . . .
These are the main points on each side, to say nothing of minor arguments, like the sceptics direct against the influence of habit, education, local customs, and so on, which the slightest puff of scepticism overturns, though they convince the majority of ordinary people, who have only this vain basis for their dogmas. You have only to look at their books . . . I pause at the dogmatists' only strong point, which is that we cannot doubt natural principles if we speak sincerely and in all good faith. To which the sceptics reply, in a word, that uncertainty as to our origin entails uncertainty as to our nature. The dogmatists have been trying to answer that ever since the world began . . .
This means an open war between men, in which everyone is obliged to take sides, either with the dogmatists or with the sceptics, because anyone who imagines he can stay neutral is a sceptic par excellence. This neutrality is the essence of their clique . . . they are not even for themselves, they are neutral, indifferent, suspending judgement on everything, including themselves.
What then is man to do in this state of affairs? Is he to doubt everything, to doubt whether he is awake, whether he is being pinched or burned? Is he to doubt whether he is doubting, to doubt whether he exists?
No one can go that far, and I maintain that a perfectly genuine sceptic has never existed . . . Is he, on the other hand, to say that he is the certain possessor of truth, when at the slightest pressure he fails to prove his claim and is compelled to loose his grasp?
What sort of a freak then is man! How novel, how monstrous, how chaotic, how paradoxical, how prodigious! Judge of all things, feeble earthworm, repository of truth, sink of doubt and error, glory and refuse of the universe! Who will unravel such a tangle? This is certainly beyond dogmatism and scepticism, beyond all human philosophy. Man transcends man. Let us concede to the sceptics what they have so often proclaimed, that truth lies beyond our scope and is an unattainable quarry."(P.131).
"Contradiction is no more an indication of falsehood than lack of it is an indication of truth"(P.177).
"Our intelligence occupies the same order of rank in the order of intellect as our body in the whole range of nature." (P.199).
Diversions and Other people etc.
ReplyDelete"Being unable to cure death, wretchedness and ignorance, men have decided, in order to be happy, not to think about such things"(P.133).
". . . I have often said that the sole cause of man's unhappiness is that he does not know how to stay quietly in his room."(P.136).
". . . but is a man not happy who can find delight in diversion? No: because it comes from somewhere else, from outside; so he is dependent, and always liable to be disturbed by a thousand and one accidents, which inevitably cause distress."(p.132).
"Man finds nothing so intolerable as to be in a state of complete rest, without passions, without occupation, without diversion, without effort. Then he faces his nullity, loneliness, inadequacy, dependence, helplessness, emptiness. And at once there wells up from the depths of his soul boredom, gloom, depression, chagrin, resentment, despair."(P622).
"I had spent a long time studying abstract sciences, and I was put off by them by seeing how little one could communicate about them. When I began the study of man I saw that these abstract sciences are not proper to man, and that I was straying further from my true condition by going into them than were others by being ignorant of them. I forgave others for not knowing much about them, but I thought I should at least find many companions in my study of man, since it is his true and proper study. I was wrong. Even fewer people study man than mathematics. It is only because they do not know how to study man that people look into all the rest. " (P.687).
"Our desire for the esteem of those around us. Pride possesses us so naturally amidst all our miseries, errors, etc. We even die gladly provided people talk about it."(P.628).
David,
ReplyDeleteHave you read "Nietzsche and Pascal on Christianity" by Charles Natoli?
You say "Pensées is profound because it won't cohere as a whole, because the parts are in conflict, and the reason why the parts are in conflict is that Pascal is driven by two contradictory things: the will to truth and the will to see Christ as saviour. Pascal's deepest hope was that there was no real conflict here, but his frequently displayed ruthless honesty entailed that numerous passages surfaced which simply don't lend themselves to an edifying Christian perspective." I'm currently reading the Pensées and don't understand how you conclude this idea. Which passages that "don't lend themselves to an edifying Christian perspective" did you have in mind? It may be that I just haven't read enough of the Pensées.
You also say "I will largely ignore the numerous passages where Pascal makes clear his devotion to Christ and I will largely ignore these passages because I find none of them convincing. Pascal's horror, despair and nausea at existence is very explicit in this work, and his flight towards Christ is largely a flight away from this existential terror." Why do you find none of those passages convincing? What passages do you have in mind when you argue that Pascal's "flight towards Christ is largely a flight away from this existential terror"?
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteNo, I haven't read it. What does it say? Are you a Christian?
Pascal takes it as self-evident that humanity is naturally corrupt, lost and that even its (nominal) virtues are vices. I assume you agree with this reading of the text since the passages supporting it are numerous and explicit, and I assume that you don't think this is an "edifying" picture of the human condition?
Nowhere in the entire text does Pascal offer a rational and well-reasoned argument that would explain and justify why an all-powerful and all-knowing, loving God, would create and tolerate such a state of affairs. On the contrary, he explicitly admits that the entire thing makes no sense at all!
"Without doubt nothing is more shocking to our reason than to say that the sin of the first man has implicated in its guilt men so far from the original sin that they seem incapable of sharing it. The flow of guilt does not seem merely impossible to us, but indeed unjust. What could be more contrary to the rules of our miserable justice than the eternal damnation of a child, incapable of will, for an act in which he seems to have so little part that it was actually committed 6,000 years before he existed? Certainly nothing jolts us more rudely than this doctrine, and yet, but for this mystery, the most incomprehensible of all, we remain incomprehensible to ourselves . . . This shows that God, in his desire to make the difficulties of our existence unintelligible to us, hid the knot so high, or more precisely, so low, that we were quite unable to reach it" (131).
It's interesting to note that Pascal generally doesn't rely on any "Arguments From Design" in support of his belief in Christ. Unlike most pre-Darwinian thinkers, he doesn't seem especially impressed by the (apparent) design we see everywhere in nature. The idea of a God as Artificer (or Watchmaker) being necessary in order to account for the bewildering complexity of organic life held little or no interest for him. His conception of God was not there to solve intellectual or scientific puzzles. On the contrary, his conception of God was deeply personal, troubling, visceral, and psychological. He found existence horrific, alienating and indigestible, and he could find no reliable escape from this suffering in anything belonging to the natural world. And, contra Socrates and the optimism of the Enlightenment, he saw reason and rationality as woefully inadequate to solving many of life's most pressing problems.
None of this is controversial, it's all very explicit throughout the text: a horror in the face of human existence and a profound and unrelenting desire to somehow escape from this horror, via transcendence. Christ / "The Hidden God" was intellectually incomprehensible to him, but without this Redeemer, life was unbearable.
This seems to me like a faith born of utter despair, by a man of extreme (physiological) sensitivity, and contrary to reason, evidence and justice. Nietzsche, in his conception and glorification of the Ubermensch, betrays the same basic tendency, alas. Although I sympathise with the sickness of these thinkers, I find neither of their cures and solutions persuasive.
David,
ReplyDeleteI haven't read it either. I thought you might have read it or be interested in it because it talks about both Nietzsche and Pascal. All I know about what it says is from a Google Books review: "the book makes three main points. First, Pascal wrote extensively about both the grandeur and the weakness of human beings (contra Nietzsche who suggests that Pascal is overly preoccupied w. human misery). Secondly, Nietzsche’s description of Christianity is overly broad and in crucial instances downright wrong. Thirdly, Natali argues that Nietzsche’s argument bogs down in some contradictory epistemological confusion between notions of truth and notions of value." Do you have any opinion on those three points?
I am a Christian. Are you a nihilist? I finished the Pensées and now understand what you meant about the unedifying passages. I was trying too hard to interpret Pascal as though he were a Christian apologist and failed to take seriously all the unedifying passages, like the one with original sin you mentioned. I'm inclined to agree that Pascal viewed Christ as an escape from his existential horror.
Do you find the Ubermensch and Christ unpersuasive just because they are contrary to reason, evidence and justice? Are you looking for a solution that is not contrary to these three things?
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteNot having read the book I can only infer the arguments behind the his 3 points:
1.I'd like to know what kind of "grandeur" the author has in mind? Man's awareness of his own existential location, his longing for meaning and purpose, his ability to be obsessed with apparently non-utilitarian concerns, his extraordinary cognitive abilities juxtaposed beside their inability to establish certainty, his longing for a kind of moral purity that mankind is constitutionally incapable of attaining; these and similar issues struck Pascal as suggestive of a humanity both base and noble. And since he cannot satisfactorily ground this paradoxical nobility in naturalistic terms, he thinks that its source must be transcendent. The crucial point is that Pascal doesn't see any "grandeur" at all in a Godless universe, any "grandeur" that mankind possesses is not of his own making, it is a dowry from God.
2. Again, without the text claiming to show where Nietzsche is "wrong" regarding Christianity, I can't profitably comment. In addition, since there are numerous denominations, sects and interpretations of Christianity, it is very easy for a critic to respond that Nietzsche's criticism, in a particular passage, is too "broad". So I don't see that, in itself, as a serious criticism.
3. The conflict between truth and value is omnipresent in Nietzsche's text, but the review you cite doesn't give me anything to bite on . . .
Am I a nihilist? I'm certainly an atheist, but "nihilist" is one of those words that mean different things to different people. Briefly: I think a Godless universe presents us with some very serious problems and difficulties. However, I don't think these problems and difficulties are thereby rendered necessarily insurmountable. We're on a tightrope - we may make it to the other side, or we may fall.
Not sure I understand your last question. Some errors and delusions are beneficial to us and perhaps indispensable to some degree, but any attempt to consciously live "contrary to reason, evidence and justice" is, I think, generally speaking, a recipe for disaster, idiocy, neurosis or toxic dogmatism.
This is not, of course, to advocate a kind of Socratic hyper-rationality in the conduct of our lives. Both Pascal and Nietzsche were intent on seeing reason as an essentially instrumental and not a determining, autonomous faculty. But, between the extremes of blind faith and (a self-deluding) hyper-rationality, many other options are available to us.
David,
ReplyDeleteGreat response to Natoli in point 1. If I ever read his book, I will let you know so you can respond to point 2 and 3.
Are you familiar with atheist Luke Muehlhauser's work on the "problems and difficulties" of atheism? Here's a post on his blog pertaining to them (unless you have different problems in mind): http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=4841
Even if you didn't understand my last question, what you said worked as a response. I agree that consciously living against reason, evidence and justice is a terrible recipe. I think of 1984 as what the recipe ends up making. Have you read 1984?
When you say "the extremes of blind faith and (a self-deluding) hyper-rationality," I assume you mean Christianity and the Ubermensch.
Some Christians would strongly disagree that Christianity is a blind faith. I personally am not sure whether I agree that it is blind or not, but I do know Christianity doesn't teach blind faith, since Jesus supposedly performed miracles so the people who saw him would have a "reason" to trust his claims. Why do you view it as blind faith? There is a debate coming up that you can watch for free online about this question: http://live.biola.edu/. If you don't have time to watch it, here's sort of a response to the blind faith objection in case you want to hear the opposing perspective: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/what-is-reasonable-faith.
What I do know of Ubermensch, I agree with you that it is self-deluding and hyper-rational. Why do you view it as hyper-rational and self-deluding? My "reason" for viewing it that way is just intuitive disgust at its weirdness.
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteI've never heard of Muehlhauser, but i've some knowledge of Rosenberg. The blog post you reference is, i'm afraid, not to my taste. Much too bright and breezy.
I wouldn't characterise 1984 and totalitarianism generally as deliberately anti-reason, but rather the misapplication of reason.
No, by "blind faith" I simply meant the deliberate decision to live in opposition to reason, evidence and justice. I wouldn't characterise either Christianity or the Ubermensch as simply belonging to this category. I think there is a large element of wishful thinking in both of these things, but in a very sophisticated manner, in the minds of Pascal and Nietzsche; but neither of these individuals deliberately lived in "opposition to reason, evidence and justice". Both were very conflicted, subtle and anti-dogmatic.
My "(self-deluding) hyper-rationality" comment applied to an aspect of Socrates, who had, I think, too high an opinion of reason and rationality. Nietzsche's/Pascal's point was that behind our reason lay our drives, our emotions, our unconscious, our needs, wants and fears and that it was very difficult (perhaps impossible) for "reason" to ever be free of this partiality and contingency. Thus it was "self-deluding" for Socrates to believe that his thoughts and his instincts were unconnected
David,
ReplyDeleteMuehlhauser is not my favorite, either. Even so, I'm not going to let his bright and breezy attitude deter me from figuring out whether what he says actually is true in the intellectual sense, although I might not identify with it emotionally. What if he's right when he says we can live happy, moral, and meaningful lives on atheism? Should the the fact that I emotionally reverberate with the idea of "existential nausea" alter the truth of Muehlhauser's views? The same goes with whether his views alter the truth of mine. What if I handed him a copy of the Pensées and he said, "Sorry, Pascal is not to my taste. He's depressing and pessimistic"? Muehlhauser is entitled to his tastes and opinions, but what if Pascal's depressing and pessimistic attitude is a reflection of the true state of the world? Muehlhauser would then be self-deluded in a way or at least willingly ignorant. What if we are self-deluded or willingly ignorant because we refuse to hear the cheerful atheists out?
You probably already have a non-emotional reason for rejecting the view of light-hearted atheism, but I don't know if your rejection of that view was made with consideration of the "arguments" the happy atheist crew gives for why we should agree with the possibility of non-deluded, cheery atheism. You may have done so and concluded they were absolutely deluded. I have considered so far only arguments and thoughts from atheists like Nietzsche, Sartre and Russell who claim atheism makes life meaningless. What they say appeals to me. After all, if they're right, then people will flee to Christianity to escape the horrible pointlessness of life without God and Jesus Christ. It makes a good starter for getting people to think about Christianity. But, what if Nietzsche, Sartre and all the unhappy atheists are a bunch of loonies who had miserable attitudes and couldn't see that atheism was just as meaningful, if not more so, than Christianity? Then why are atheists everywhere continuing to wallow in unmerited misery? And why are Christians everywhere continuing to shun atheism because they think without God they would have nothing to live for, when in fact both camps are wrong? My point is we need to consider both sides of any issue, especially since failing to do so leads to disordered thinking, and I think you know that. My questions is if you know that we need to consider both sides of the issue, why do you so readily put Muehlhauser's perspective aside? Unless you already have considered both sides of the issue, do not expect to find any new objections or arguments on the opposing side, and concluded happy atheism was hogwash.
Why do you view 1984/totalitarianism as the misapplication of reason? How is it the misapplication of reason? Concepts like "doublethink" in 1984 seem deliberately anti-reason. Do you have a specific definition of "reason"?
Thank you for correcting my misunderstanding on what blind faith and hyper-rationality were referring to. I agree that our reasoning is strongly affected by our instincts and biases. Psychology shows evidence, like strangely thinking sugar prevents cavities whenever you want to eat a cookie and ignoring or explaining away evidence that supports the conclusion "God does not exist" because we want or presuppose that God exists.
Do I have your permission to quote you and use your work in a podcast and possibly in writing? I would reference and cite you.
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteOf course it is possible to live a happy, moral and meaningful life as an atheist. That goes without saying . . .
But atheism is not a belief system, as such. Almost nothing necessarily follows from this atheistic axiom. From this common root all manner of things can result which have effectively nothing in common.
With regards to the "meaning of existence" question: there is no discernible cosmic, metaphysical, transcendent "meaning" to our lives. But it does not follow that because we lack transcendent validation that our lives are rendered meaningless for us, as living, embodied beings. This would be to continue to apply Platonic / Christian / Metaphysical value judgements after we had abandoned those foundational belief-systems. This is the sort of "nihilism" that Nietzsche repeatedly argues against.
Is our love for those earthly people and things most precious to us somehow unwarranted simply because it is not sanctioned by a (non-existent) God? Many religions say Yes. I, along with Nietzsche and Russell say No. Our lives have value (when they have value) soley because we endow them with value.
But, Muehlhauser's post left out a whole host of difficulties that may befall us in this life. And in the face of many of these difficulties, simply to suggest to the reader that the absence of a God is an adequate and commensurate response is, to my mind, beside the point and wholly inadequate. One can have no real existential neurosis at all (unlike Pascal and Nietzsche), and yet still encounter a life of severe suffering and anguish. Muehlhauser's post seemed oblivious to this very obvious point, and that's why I found it rather shallow.
Religion, in part, is a response to certain kinds of suffering that humanity commonly encounters. But to reject the religious response to these problems is not, by any means, to thereby automatically overcome these problems. But, everything depends upon the kind of problems we have in mind: problems such as war, death, betrayl, social impotency, lovelessness, psychological and physical ailments, deceit, fanaticism, hatred, violence, corruption, toxic ignorance and dogmatism, time, apathy, legalised injustice, extreme poverty etc - in short, "the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to" (Hamlet) - these problems won't simply vanish because of atheism.
As I say, atheism isn't itself a world-view of any practical and discernible content. It's simply the rejection of a very specific metaphysical axiom. The atheist has emptied his cup of God (more correctly, the concept of God), but all manner of things may take its place, both good and bad, sublime and horrific.
1984, and the kinds of left-wing totalitarianism that Orwell fought against grew out of, in part, a flawed quasi-rationalistic project from the Enlightenment, through to Marx and beyond. Most of the leading intellectuals of this movement thought of themselves as heirs of this rationalistic tradition, opportunists, hypocrites and idiots aside. But it should be obvious that as soon as things become dogmatic, and self-correcting mechanisms are henceforth forbidden, things have descended into tyranny and farce. Right-wing forms of totalitarianism, admittedly, are somewhat differently "grounded" and have a "Romantic" element pushed to the foreground.
In addition, there are kinds of irrationality that an individual may adopt that are not easily universalised. Why? Because the former effects fewer people (or fewer powerful people), and therefore encounters relatively weak social resistance.
You are free to use my comments in any manner you see fit, on the understanding that I may not endorse your interpretation of those comments. Thanks for asking.
David,
ReplyDeleteI do agree that any person, atheist or not, can live a so-called happy, moral, and meaningful life. My point was whether living a happy, moral, and meaningful life on atheism, or Christianity, or Islam etc. is consistent with these views or is it a form of self-delusion. As you say, atheism doesn't claim that morality, happiness and meaning are impossible. It doesn't say anything on those matters. It just denies the existence of God. Even so, I've heard (as you also mention) atheists and theists alike claiming that a consequence of atheism is that there is no meaning or objective morality. But you, as an atheist, say that we can endow value to our lives. Do you mean that we think there is value to our lives, feel value and subjectively perceive value even though there isn't any such thing, or do you mean that there really is value and it isn't just in our minds? As a follow-up question I'd like to ask you why you see it the way you do?
Your point on Muehlhauser neglecting the problem of evil is well-taken. I searched on his blog and it didn't look like he addressed it in any posts in relation to atheism, just in relation to theism.
I understand now what you meant by "misapplication of reason." I agree with you then.
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteWhen I say "moral" and "meaningful" I mean from the viewpoint of the individual concerned or from the community to which they belong. These terms don't have any intrinsic or pre-existing status.
Many religious people don't realise that, if they really think things through, they also share this viewpoint.
Consider: is X good because it is "good-in-itself", or is X good soley because God decrees it so? From a theist perspective, can X be good even if God decrees it bad or indifferent? Every theist i've encountered says No, they say that X is good, not because it is good-in-itself, but because God deems it so, and that God has, in principle, total freedom in the realm of morality. i.e. God can deem literally anything good or bad and is not constrained by any conceptions of good or evil outside himself.
What this means is that good is defined wholly by God's power and not by any standard of morality independent of God. From a theist perspective, good is whatever God says is good, there is no "good-in-itself"; therefore there is no "objective" morality, even from a theist perspective.
To claim that there is a genuinely "objective" morality means that even God would be bound by it and could, in principle, be rightfully judged bad by it. But the question then immediately arises - what is the source of authority of this so-called "objective morality" if it is not God? And the same arguments apply to the concept of "meaning".
Accordingly, I don't believe in any genuinely "objective" morality, and I think both theists and atheists are in the same boat here (even if many theists think otherwise).
Regarding your follow up question: intrinsic "value" does not reside in rocks or plants, or weather, it is a concept unintelligible independent of mind. But, and this is the crucial point, everything doesn't somehow become automatically hollow for us in the absence of a Divine mind, legitimising things. Historically, we have been told that things only have value because a source high above us endows things with value. This was an understandable error, but it was an error nevertheless.
I see no reason why my love and concern for my children, my wife, my parents and friends, and my concern for my own well-being should not be self-sustaining and in need of outside validation.
Put simply:
Wife/Child - "Do you love me and care for me, and yourself also"?
Theist - "Yes, of course I do".
Wife/Child - "Why"?
Theist - "Ultimately, because God exists and approves of it".
Wife/Child - "What if God didn't exist"?
Theist - "Then you and the entire world would mean absolutely nothing to me".
Wife/Child - "Then you don't really love us and yourself at all. You only love God".
Theist - "Correct".
An unspeakable amount of unnecessary suffering has been caused by this viewpoint.
Broadly speaking, I think there are two types of "religious" people. On the one hand, there are those who are personally troubled by earthly suffering who seek redemption and justice and peace via the concept of an after-life and eternity through the grace of a higher moral power. On the other hand, there are those who who use religion primarily to persecute and control the behaviour of others, and are little troubled by any "existential" pains. I have sympathy with the former but consider the latter dangerous and generally deleterious to human welfare.
David,
ReplyDeleteIs X good because it's good-in-itself or is X good because God decrees it "good"? According to some, this is a false dilemma! There's no need to worry about some objective moral authority God must submit to. There's no need to fear that God's declarations of what's good are arbitrary, they say. The third option in this dilemma is that "God is good." In other words, good is God's character and nature. Good is not something we ascribe to God or something different from God. When we say something is "morally good" that's another way of saying that something is reflecting God's own character. Morality would be objective in the sense that God is eternal and his character is unchanging. Any thoughts about this view?
I would agree with you that your love for anyone is self-sustaining and perfectly fine without outside validation, but I only see it that way if you define love as merely a chemical reaction or entity in the brain. That would apply with any moral virtue etc. on atheism. "Love" would be a word representing that chemical reaction or entity that we are experiencing in the brain. Would you agree?
Any reflective theist can conclude, I think, that he ought not to love someone or something because God exists and approves of it, since that sort of love would be contrived, but that he love as a natural reflex (even if it could just be a chemical reaction) irrespective of his belief in God. Although, he might believe that this "natural reflex" is only possible because God exists and created mankind with that ability.
Thank you for that distinction between the "religious" people. New atheists like Richard Dawkins claim that only the second type of religious person exists.
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteI see no evidence that it's a "false dilema" at all. To say that "God is good" while transcending all other moral sources, is simply a euphemistic way of saying that "God is, above all else, powerful. And when God decrees any X as 'good', it is the height of prudence and expediency on our part to obey". It's simply another way of saying "God is power; hence good is whatever God decrees is good".
Nor do I see what could possibly ground the claim that God's "character is unchanging"! (I'll ignore here the fact that scripture has God frequently displaying a changeable character). If God's status as an all-powerful being is (axiomatically)true, then it follows that God's character can be as changeable as He likes, and that if God is unchanging it is soley because He desires it (for his own, inscrutable reasons) and not due to any other source of constraint. Moreover, there is something self-evidently ludicrous about us puny little humans thinking we can know God's nature through a priori methods. It's no small matter that Pascal often refers to Him as "The Hidden God".
I don't understand your point about love and chemistry and validation. Feel free to elaborate.
I know of no historically influential Christian theologian who thinks that our love for other human beings, qua human beings, can be considered adequately self-sustaining. According to orthodoxy, every time we love another human we are never to forget that the qualities they have are not of their own making, but reveal to us the fingerprint of God. To love this world and the things of this world, and to rest content with that, is, according to orthodoxy, a very grave sin.
The orthodox religious viewpoint, after all, is not that life without God can be good, but that with God it is so much better. Rather, it is that without God, life, all life, is worthless, meaningless and contemptible. Fortunately for humanity, no evidence supporting this claim has ever been forthcoming.
A large part of this, I think, is due simply to historical contingency. These religions arose and flourished in ages when the most appaling suffering was virtually omnipresent, and when a sense of powerlessness was very common among the majority of humanity. It was natural, in such circumstances, to shift the focus of existence onto a hoped-for after-life and to regard all purely worldly concerns as distractions worthy of denigration. In other words, the message was: "Don't attach yourself too strongly to any worldly person or object, including yourself, because at any moment they may perish or alter without your consent. And since our needs and desires are not met in this world, place your hopes in eternity and God's perfection and don't be seduced by the false and unreliable glitter of this earthly realm".
Societies and individuals raised in happier, more secure and manageable circumstances, in the midst of accelerating scientific and technological knowledge, are not the natural audience for this bleak message. Of course, the "existential" types, like Pascal or Dostoyevsky, for example, experience this "progress" quite differently.
David,
ReplyDeleteI now realize that my explanation of the third alternative was unclear and incomplete. Here is a better explanation from William Lane Craig:
“We don’t need to refute either of the two horns of the Euthyphro dilemma, because the dilemma it presents is a false one: There’s a third alternative, namely, God wills something because He is good. What do I mean by that? I mean that God’s own nature is the standard of goodness, and His commandments to us are expressions of His nature. In short, our moral duties are determined by the commands of a just and loving God. So moral values are not independent of God because God’s own character defines what is good. God is essentially compassionate, fair, kind, impartial, and so on. His nature is the moral standard defining good and bad. His commands necessarily reflect His moral nature. Therefore, they’re not arbitrary. When the atheist demands, ‘If God were to command child abuse, would we be obligated to abuse our children?’ he’s asking a question like ‘If there were a square circle, would its area be the square of one of its sides?’ There is no answer because what it supposes is logically impossible.
So the Euthphro dilemma presenst us with a false choice, and we shouldn’t be tricked by it. The morally good/bad is determined by God’s nature, and the morally right/wrong is determined by His will. God wills something because He is good, and something is right because God wills it.” (On Guard 135-6).
When Craig talks of God being “essentially compassionate, fair, kind, impartial, etc.” he does not mean they are properties we ASCRIBE to God, but they are “properties” that can be ascribed to HUMANS that we use when talking about God but which are literally DERIVED from God. All of the properties we humans call “good” are just the raw, “essential nature of God.” It is not as though God is “transcendant” to good, he IS good—not good as an adjective, but good as a noun (kind of like Plato’s Form of the Good). Notice Craig doesn’t say, “What is good defines God’s own character,” he says, “God’s own character defines what is good.”
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI only have time to respond to your first post now. I'll get to your other posts sometime later.
Let me be frank. I think WLC here is either very confused or is being disingenuous.
He says: ". . . God’s own nature is the standard of goodness, and His commandments to us are expressions of His nature" and " . . . God’s own character defines what is good".
To claim that God's own nature and "The good" are unavoidably coextensive, in fact one and the same thing, is, as i've said, merely a euphemistic way of saying that "God is power".
The concept "good" is co-dependent upon the concept "bad", these concepts are mutually parasitic on each other. The one makes no sense, and has no real meaning, without the other.
Imagine, if you will, God prior creation. What would it mean here to say that God is "Good"? The word "Good" here is superflous, and adds nothing to our knowledge of anything. "Good" only makes sense as a concept if "bad" is conceivable or capable of being actualised. But if God is the only being in the universe then God just IS and all moral concepts are nonsensical, prior to creation.
WLC, on the other hand, wants to suggest that the concept of "good" pre-dates creation itself because it is intrinsic to God's nature, and thus the concept of "good" is valid even if God is the only being in the universe (strictly speaking, of course, the universe didn't exist at this point and God is presumed to exist outside space and time). The idea of the concept "good" pre-dating creation strikes me as mere wordplay and confusion because its counterpart, the concept of "bad", has yet to make its appearance.
His allusions to child abuse and square circles is, I think, deliberately obscurantist. A square circle is a conceptual impossibility because we understand that a square and circle are definitionally incompatible. We can see this impossibility purely on a priori grounds, but we also know that both squares and circles actually exist. The same can't be said of God.
All WLC is doing is defining God in such a way that he can't be refuted by any logical or empirical methods. All one has to do is say that God transcends these human dialectical and empirical instruments, and before long, you arrive at a God who is ineffable. But if it's an ineffable God that's being affirmed, then silence is the best wisdom, but in practise, virtually no believer conforms to this model.
I'm also astonished that he is attempting to portray something like child abuse (and, by extension, injustice generally) as being fundamentally alien to God's nature. WLC seems to be saying, in reply to his atheist interlocutor, "The moral dilema you pose, in reality, just can't happen, because God would never countenance the suffering of innocent children".
Has he read the Bible?
Obviously, with the aid of bad arguments and selective blindness, every counter argument can be refuted, misrepresented or simply ignored. I doubt anything I could possibly say would give WLC pause for thought, because, in the final analysis, man is not a rational, truth-seeking animal, but a being dominated by concrete, immediate, practical, visceral and psychological needs and desires.
I'm sorry, but I see no evidence that any "third" possibility exists regarding this question. God is, first and foremost, ultimate power, and concepts of "good" are derivative phenomena that subsequently emerge from this primordial, axiomatic fact.
Good as we understand it after creation, co-dependent on bad, would not make any sense prior to creation. If God is the only thing that exists, there is no such thing as “good,” if good is derived from God’s nature. Because there won’t be anything in existence that is derived from God’s nature. God will be the only thing that exists. Once things are created, “good” and “bad” come into existence in the sense that suddenly there are things that are “like God” and “not like God.” Everything is “bad” because nothing else is God. So everything is “not like God” in some way, at least in the sense that it isn’t God. (The Existence and Irrelevance of Gratuitous Evil in Philosophia Christia, Kirk R. MacGregor).
DeleteI realize that, if God exists his committing or commanding injustice is not self-evidently logically incoherent. It only is if you assume that God conforms to our “moral” intuitions—e.g., child abuse is wrong, only what is right is derived from God, therefore God could not command child abuse because that is wrong, and he only commands what is right and derived from him.
That could be a reason why to appeal to the Bible and revelation, because God largely transcends our human attempts to comprehend him apart from revelation. But Craig does not think God transcends these things. He believes arguments for God’s existence are very sound and logically valid. He doesn’t think God’s ineffable at all, considering everything I’ve ever read from him. He does in fact believe that God could be falsified if we can show that the concept of God is incoherent, or come up with logical rather than emotional/evidential argument against God from the problem of evil.
Dr. Craig has definitely read the Bible. There are a lot of claims about “unjust” actions on God’s part. Which one(s) do you have in mind? Some of them can be “explained away.” The only one I can think of that I would find unjust is the “binding of Isaac,” when God tells Abraham to sacrifice Isaac. That was probably traumatizing to Isaac, kind of like child abuse. If the point of the story was to show how God condemned child sacrifice, while other nations celebrated it, then God just as easily could have told Abraham without all that trouble and trauma that child sacrifice was “wrong.” Some Christians would say that the story is allegorical of the crucifixion of Christ, when God sacrificed his “Son.” They would say that there’s no problem with Abraham being told to sacrifice Isaac since God went so far as to actually do it with Jesus of Nazareth. But, then why didn’t God say sacrificing kids is OK, since he was, technically, going to do it someday himself? There are also verses about God saying he will make the Jews eat their children because they will starve during a siege. That could be exaggerated language. It could also be blatantly cruel—like original sin, as Pascal mentioned how unjust that appears.
I would agree that we are not naturally rational and truth-seeking. But, it seems to me that some people are able to go that route and fight against their psychological needs and desires. These people actually pause for thought rather than rest in their comfortable presuppositions. A person I have in mind would be Muehlhauser, who has changed his mind several times, for example when it comes to the potential of artifical intelligence: “I didn’t use to think so, but I’ve become persuaded that unfriendly machine superintelligence is the most plausible cause of total human extinction.” http://commonsenseatheism.com/?p=14936
Perhaps you could say that being truth-seeking is a psychological drive, however misguided.
For now, I see no evidence or argument that could convincingly show that God is not “ultimate power.” It all comes down to speculation and our personal preferences if we try think “rationally” about him. Why think God is constrained by logic? Why not agree with Descartes that God can make square circles? We might be able to come to some vague idea of God through reason, for example an “unmoved mover,” but that doesn’t tell us a whole lot about him. In fact, even the Bible doesn’t explicitly deny or affirm that God is power. If we can say “God is love” (1 John 4:8), why not “God is power”? It seems to depend on whether we believe God can contradict himself, contradict our perceptions of logic, contradict evidence, and get away with it! There aren’t a lot of great reasons to think God can or can’t do any of those things previously mentioned. If we decide to trust revelation, the Bible says “he cannot deny himself” (2 Tim 2:13), so God cannot contradict himsel and is therefore not ultimate power. The Bible isn’t necessarily evidence or an arguement, but it seems to me that Pascal was at least on the right track when he said, “Not only do we know God through Jesus Christ, but we only know ourselves through Jesus Christ; we only know life and death through Jesus Christ. Apart from Jesus Christ we cannot know the meaning of our life or our death, of God or of ourselves. Thus without Scripture, whose only object is Christ, we know nothing, and can see nothing but obscurity and confusion in the nature of God and in nature itself” (417).
DeleteThe question would then be, Why would God make us so intellectually bankrupt and incapable of knowing him apart from revelation? Is it so some obscure tribal group can exercise greater power and control over the rest because they alone have the true “revelation” of the obscure God? So everyone has to come fawning to them to find out what this God is like? Is it because we would lean towards self-suffiency? Initially, we are in this blissful state of “perfection” in a “garden of Eden” wherein our minds are not marred by original sin and concupiscience. We become pretty sure of ourselves and aim for at least MORAL knowledge without depending on God, and so God leaves us to figure things out on our own, just like we wanted, but he curses us so our attempts to do so are pretty pathetic. Ultimately we have to turn back to him to truly know anything. That all sounds like a cruel game on God’s part, though.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI think we may have reached an impasse. It's not always been clear to me when you cite some "authority" whether you are in agreement or not? What this means is that I could end up responding to an almost infinite number of (often contradictory) arguments, plucked from the wide spectrum of Christian thought.
This possibility doesn't enthrall me because i've already spent (wasted) a large portion of my life looking for God. I have thought long and hard on these matters, over many years, and have yet to encounter a single theist argument I considered credible (morally or intellectually). My atheism is not the result of laziness, indifference or unfamiliarity with the subject. Quite the reverse . . . Consequently, I gave up "looking" for a theistic God a long time ago.
I have sympathy with some of those who seek "meaning" and "coherence" in existence and who, as a result, are interested in what religion has to say on these matters. But any modern individual who is actually impressed by religion's answers to life's existential and epistemic problems is, in my view, either in significant (spiritual) pain or in superficial denial. I have sympathy for those in the former category, but not for those in the latter.
Regarding the question of God's "injustice", I found your remark that "The only one [example] I can think of that I would find unjust is the 'binding of Isaac'" utterly incomprehensible, given that the OT in particular is filled with examples of God's arbitrary wrath.
Consequently, I put WLC into google, and after 5 minuets came across this, regarding the slaughter of the Canaanites:
http://www.reasonablefaith.org/slaughter-of-the-canaanites
I could hardly believe my eyes when I read it. It's one of the most nakedly appaling pieces of procrustean (im)moralism and sophistry i've come across in a very long time.
It's not my intention to gratuitously disparage anyone's sincerely held beliefs if those beliefs give comfort without inflicting suffering on others. Let each person choose their own path, provided others and the "common good", are not seriously jeopardised by this freedom. If you find WLC, for example, to be a credible and noteworthy contributor to these issues, then there's honestly nothing worthwhile and constructive I can add to the conversation. The gap is simply too wide.
My primary interest is in Nietzsche, and, to a lesser extent, Pascal. But my interest in, and admiration for Pascal, is largely in spite of, and certainly not because of, his religiosity (hence the thread's subtitle). Pascal, at his best, is incredibly insightful regarding many matters, he is a wonderful writer, and in possession of a quite formidable intellect. But he's also very damaged and oppressed by the darkest, most pessimistic and hopeless, fears, moods, revulsions and worries. These failings mark him out as a real flesh and blood person, in a great deal of anguish.
In utter desperation and bewilderment, he saw Jesus as the only conceivable route out of his personal abyss. I think he was wrong. Profoundly and utterly wrong. But I recognise him as a very great man nevertheless, struggling to escape from a terrifying (personal) predicament.
But, and this is the point that needs emphasising, his greatness (for me) is evident in his non-religious engagements. He was, in a very real sense, ruined (or at least made worse) by religious baggage. He sought, above all, metaphysical justification for his heartrending self-contempt, and he claimed to have found it in Christian doctrine. This self-loathing and vulnerability was the kernel of his whole belief.
But the real causes of self-loathing and vulnerability, I think, are to be found entirely in the material world, and failure to accept this fact prevents us from seeking (and hence finding) cures in the only world that really matters or exists. This world.
David,
DeleteI will now start clarifying whether I agree with the people I quote. I do agree with Craig that “God’s own character defines what is good” and with Kirk MacGregor that evil is whatever is “not like God.” I am inclined to disagree with some of the Catholic catechism I cited. I did not actually intend for the catechism to serve as any kind of argument. Your responses to any of the arguments I cite or invent may not enthrall you, but it can serve to correct my thinking and complanceny as well as any of your blog readers’ thoughts. Maybe a lot of your ideas are the same as Nietzsche’s, and the arguments against those ideas can reveal weaknesses in Nietzsche’s ideas (although many of the arguments are themselves weak). You might encounter a new argument or learn something new. I certainly have. After reading over your comments, I have changed my mind several times and doubted Christianity. Surely your studying hasn’t been a waste.
There are a lot of examples of God’s wrath in the Bible, and some are arbitrary at first glance. I have found that examples of arbitrary wrath turn out to probably be nonarbitrary. Maybe the explanations are not conclusive beyond all doubt, but they are usually adequate. To reiterate, the only one that comes to mind that ends up eluding most adequate explanation is the binding of Isaac. I would like to find all of these examples in the Bible and reconsider my claim of their being “nonarbitrary” sometime. I assume that the slaughter of the Canaanites was an example of arbitrary wrath you had in mind.
Craig revisits the questions of the Canaanites and revises his answer somewhat, it might not strike you as repulsive as his first one:
“There is one important aspect of my answer that I would change, however. I have come to appreciate as a result of a closer reading of the biblical text that God’s command to Israel was not primarily to exterminate the Canaanites but to drive them out of the land. It was the land that was (and remains today!) paramount in the minds of these Ancient Near Eastern peoples. The Canaanite tribal kingdoms which occupied the land were to be destroyed as nation states, not as individuals. The judgment of God upon these tribal groups, which had become so incredibly debauched by that time, is that they were being divested of their land. Canaan was being given over to Israel, whom God had now brought out of Egypt. If the Canaanite tribes, seeing the armies of Israel, had simply chosen to flee, no one would have been killed at all. There was no command to pursue and hunt down the Canaanite peoples.
It is therefore completely misleading to characterize God’s command to Israel as a command to commit genocide. Rather it was first and foremost a command to drive the tribes out of the land and to occupy it. Only those who remained behind were to be utterly exterminated. There may have been no non-combatants killed at all. That makes sense of why there is no record of the killing of women and children, such as I had vividly imagined. Such scenes may have never taken place, since it was the soldiers who remained to fight. It is also why there were plenty of Canaanite people around after the conquest of the land, as the biblical record attests.” http://www.reasonablefaith.org/the-slaughter-of-the-canaanites-re-visited#ixzz2KGNT9rnV
I would say this is a legitimate view and agree with it as a statement of biblical “fact.”
Though you will find similar views to Craig here, I think STR states the problem of the slaughter of the Canaanites in a clearer and more rational way: http://www.str.org/site/DocServer/Enhanced_SG_January_2013.pdf?docID=6822
I do think Craig often is a “credible and noteworthy contributor.” He does a good job explaining Christian doctrines like the Trinity and Incarnation. Other times, however, he is not credible and noteworthy. I think his moral argument is not convincing; he appeals to “moral intuiton” to prove one of his premises.
DeleteI’m not sure whether to agree with you or not that Pascal’s religious beliefs worsened him. Have you read any books about Pascal by other people?
Why do you think Pascal was wrong about Jesus being “the only conceivable route our of his personal abyss”?
What do you think are the real causes of self-loathing etc. on materialism?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteLet me paraphrase what Craig and yourself seem to be saying:
1. The Canaanites are alledged to be living in an "incredibly debauched" manner.
2. The Canaanites are alledged to be occupying land that, Israel claims, God has set aside for it.
3. If the Canaanites simply remove themselves from the land, none of them will be killed.
Some obvious problems with this picture:
a)How is the alledged "debauchery" of the Canaanites, who were also created by this God, to be explained? Why would the Canaanites chose "debauchery" over conformity to God's will? The short answer is that God, in his infinite wisdom and justice, chose NOT to reveal himself to the Canaanites as he did to the Jews.
So the Canaanites are essentially being punished because God chose (for some unexplained reason) NOT to reveal himself to the entire world, or even to all the people's of the region, but to his "chosen people". Why didn't God simply tell the Canaanites directly his own will?
b) The alledged "debauchery" is seen to be actually irrelevent to the slaughter. If the Canaanites leave the contested land and practise their "debauchery" somewhere else, they would all have been spared.
Again, why should the Canaanites leave the land? Is it reasonable to expect a people to abandon its land simply because an opposing external power claims it has God on its side? How is anyone to decide the veracity among competing claims about God's will and personal revelations?
This logic would justify every religiously inspired tyranny imaginable. And why stop at religion? Are Communists and Nazis, and everything in-between, not entitled to the same prerogatives?
"Our wisest sages have examined the matter closely and concluded that [insert your chosen religion/ideology] God (or Dialectical Materialism, or Social Darwinism and Race-science) wants X. Everyone is free to conform to this insight (revelation), but those who do not will be exterminated. This is the will of the Lord (or Hitler, Stalin etc), and anyone who opposes it is, ipso facto, an enemy of God and thus evil".
c)Are we to seriously believe that the children and babies of Canaan were also "incredibly debauched", or were expected to unilaterally leave the land because the priests of an opposing army said so?
d) Craig seems to entertain the possibility that, in fact, none of the "women and children" were slaughtered. Are we meant to be morally comfortable with this possibility? Are these fatherless children and husband-less wives imagined to have suffered no trauma as a result of this slaughter?
e) According to Craig, if any woman or child physically resist, then they too are to be rightfully slaughtered.
f) Even if women and children don't physically resist, but offer only passive resistance i.e. refuse to leave the land and recognise Israel's claims, then they too are to be slaughtered? Or are they to be spared death and merely consigned to the status of second class citizens?
I could go on . . . The whole thing is absurd and morally repugnant, and, at bottom, seems, in general, to rest upon a few simple axioms.
Such as:
1. Everything that appears to be irrational, illogical, inconsistent, scientifically false, and incoherent is actually allegorical, or simply the result of our own very limited human constraints and conceptualisations. God simply knows far more than the wisest of us can ever hope to, so none of our critical judgements have any lasting authority.
2. In the realm of morality, what may appear to us as injustice, cruelty, immorality, and irrational wrath on God's part, is, in fact, only so from our very limited, partial and corrupt perspective. But we must remember that man is not "the measure of things", God is; and from God's perspective, we trust, every aspect of existence is unavoidably consistent with a supremely moral God.
re: Pascal, here's the sort of thing I mean:
Delete"No other religion has proposed we hate ourselves. No other religion therefore can please those who hate themselves and seek a being who is really worthy of love"(P.220)
"No religion except our own has taught that man is born sinful, no philosophical sect has said so, so none has told the truth" (P.421).
"Man's greatness comes from knowing he is wretched" (P.114).
"What are we to conclude from all our darkness but our unworthiness?"(P.445).
Here is a very great thinker crippled by a very explicit self-contempt. Some of this self-contempt derives from adhering to Christian value judgements regarding human nature that make little or no sense, as Pascal himself admits, outside this worldview. In addition, some of it comes from his realisation that the (natural) world doesn't conform to our desires (what Freud called the 'Reality Principle'), our desire for love, joy, knowledge, security, eternity etc.
And yet, there are very many passages in Pascal which display the most insightful and unflinching realism regarding the human condition, and which owe nothing to looking at existence through the lens of Christian value judgements. This is what Nietzsche means when he states that Pascal was ruined by Christianity. Obviously, Pascal himself didn't see it that way.
I read Reasons of the Heart by Marvin O'Connell, which was an explicitly Christian perspective. I thought it was dreadful, but can't remember any of the details now.
Briefly, I think Pascal was "wrong" because I don't believe in an afterlife where Jesus awaits him.
In many cases, it is euphemistically argued (because people fear being labelled 'elitist')that Christianity (and religion generally) isn't actually true, but it is useful to individuals and societies. I think most of the time (yes, there are exceptions) Pascal experienced his religion as deeply unsettling and painful. It certainly didn't make him "happy" in any conventional sense of that word. On the contrary, it seemed to "explain" and "justify" and make intelligible to him all his suffering and agony. In short, I think the cure is worse than the disease.
So I think he was intellectually wrong and viscerally/psychologically wrong.
Let me use a crass analogy: let's imagine i'm abused and then thoughtlessly abandoned as a child by my parents, and subsequently raised by cruel or indifferent guardians. Perhaps i'm a sensitive child and ache to be loved and protected by some authority figure. But no such authority figure comes forth to me. I am lost.
Consequently, perhaps I blame myself for the world's awful treatment of me and convince myself that I am hopelessly unworthy. In this way, masochistic as it is, I protect myself from the thought that morality plays no crucial part in existence, and I convince myself, in ways I can't quite explain, that I somehow deserve my suffering and that, if I can only purify myself of my immorality, a world of love and protection awaits me (if not here then in some indemonstrable future life).
Perhaps I spend much of my time writing letters of the starkest self-disgust and shame and guilt to my parents, taking responsibility for all my own pain and prostrate myself in all sincerity, begging their forgiveness and binding myself to their judgement, whatever it may be.
My greatest hope is that one day they may read the letters and come to accept me, depraved as I am; but, whatever happens, I am convinced that without their love and protection, no salvation or redemption is possible for me.
This, for me, is Christianity (taken seriously) in an nutshell. It's premises are wrong and so are its conclusions.
I don't deny that for some people it brings reassurance, comfort and coherence, but it purchases these things at the cost of simultaneously inflicting a vast amount of ignorance, self-righteousness and suffering onto others.
David,
DeleteI agree with contentions 1 and 2 as you state them. I think Craig would agree with 3. I read the biblical text on the Canaanite slaughtering and found that Craig would be incorrect to agree with 3.
This is why Craig would be incorrect:
“However, they did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer, so the Canaanites have lived in the midst of Ephraim to this day but have been made to do forced labor” (Joshua 16:10).
So, the Canaanites could remain without being killed, they just had to do forced labor. Those who did fight back were in all likelihood killed. But, this was NOT the original intent of the “commandment.” If the Israelites actually obeyed their God, then everybody who dared to remain would be killed. There would be no chance of forced labor. They had to be driven out or killed. The reason for this was “ ‘that they may not teach you [Israelites] to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the Lord your God’ ” (Deuteronomy 20:18). God’s intent for the Israelites was that they be the “good” nation who helped guide other nations to conform to God’s will. They needed to be separate to avoid assimilating to the other nation’s ways. Of course, one wonders why God could not just make the Israelites live somewhere far away from all of the evil nations rather than go around driving the evil nations far away from them. Especially since, as you point out, the evil nations just keep doing evil in other places. Anyone could conjecture that God “needed” the Israelites to be in that one spot for some reason, or else history could have unfolded completely differently. It could have, but I don’t see how that “justifies” (humanly speaking) the complex decision to drive out or slay all preoccupants of the land. Part of the “punishment” of these wicked inhabitants was the very fact they were driven out, apparently, but that doesn’t make much of an impact on their overall practice of evil as far as we know. It might give them so momentary discomfort. As you imply in the two axioms, we can hardly guess what particular reason an incomprehensible being outside of space and time would have for any of his actions unless he told us himself. And, speaking in a purely rational and basic sense, if we say there is any sort of self-evident, legitimate justification for the Israelites driving people away because God said so, that means there is such justification for the acts of Hitler etc.—I could argue that because the Canaanites were so corrupt that makes a difference, but if, as you say, the corruption just got pushed around on the map rather than extinguished, it is a distinction without a difference.
Canaanite widows and fatherless children might be upset by the loss of their fathers and husbands (considering the Canaanite culture, I’m not sure about that). But, whether we go the route that they live or die, either way we have some complaints. So, Craig’s bringing up the possibilty they aren’t killed doesn’t add to his response.
Now, what would a baby know of these abominable practices? Nothing, I suspect. The killing of Canaanite babies would be stupid and pointless. Older children might know something of the abominable practices, but they could probably be disciplined out of them easily, and as impressionable kids they might readily conform to the Israelite society and drop all of their old ways. Or they could hold grudges against the people who drove their families away and killed their fathers. Anyway, I think the Canaanite children’s parents would want them to accompany them as they are driven out of the land. We can suppose that the Israelites warned the Canaanites that they would kill them if they tried to resist, and any Canaanite family would flee to save their children. But, considering that the Canaanites would sacrifice their children to the god Molech, the desire to protect their children from the Israelites could have been nonexistent.
The failure to drive out or kill the Canaanites supposedly had terribly consequences for the Israelites and their mission as the “light to the world”:
Delete“’ [God speaking]But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then those of them whom you let remain shall be as barbs in your eyes and thorns in your sides, and they shall trouble you in the land where you dwell. And I will do to you as I thought to do to them’” (Numbers 33:55-6). Since neither of these exactly happened, the passive-obedient Canaanites who stayed behind in society helped open cracks in it so that Israel began assimilating to the Canaanite ways (of course this would not have been the only principle leading to debauchery in Israel).
The fate God originally allotted the Canaanites was the same fate allotted Israel when it “followed Canaan’s footsteps” in the path of “incredible debauchery.” Israel/Judah (since Israel was divided into two kingdoms at the time of the exile) was driven out of the land, and everyone who tried to stay behind was killed.
“ ‘Because you have said, “The Lord has raised up prophets for us in Babylon,” thus says the Lord concerning the king who sits on the throne of David, and concerning all the people who dwell in this city, your kinsmen who did not go out with you into exile: “Thus says the Lord of hosts, behold, I am sending on them sword, famine, and pestilence, and I will make them like vile figs that are so rotten they cannot be eaten. I will pursue them with sword, famine, and pestilence, and will make them a horror to all the kingdoms of the earth, to be a curse, a terror, a hissing, and a reproach among all the nations where I have driven them, because they did not pay attention to my words, declares the Lord, that I persistently sent to you by my servants the prophets, but you would not listen, declares the Lord” ’ ” (Jeremiah 29:15-19).
Notice how Israel/Judah, even after having received God’s “revelation,” from miracles to a Law, went the way of incredible debauchery—the same state Canaan was supposedly in when Israel went and “drove” the Canaanites away. So, having God reveal his will to a nation does not necessarily mean it will conform to that will. Even repeatedly telling his will to a nation, while it is in a state of debauchery at least, does not help things (as seen with their refusal to heed the prophets).
There is also the claim that all the stories we find in at least the first five books of the Bible were invented, so that probably no “Slaughtering of the Canaanites” ever happened. Even so, the moral problem that comes from it doesn’t disappear but can just be shifted to other atrocities like the Holocaust (which was undoubtedly worse than any Canaanite slaughtering).
Your axioms, I think, are indeed what is behind a lot of Christian and Jewish rationalizing the Bible etc.
From a “godless” perspective, these axioms strike me as comical, sad, and the desperate attempts of religious people to keep their unconscious (or subconscious) fears and doubts and “cognitive dissonance” from every reaching the surface. As a Christian, I do not consciously try to stifle my uncertainties etc. by postulating those two axioms. I do believe and agree with them, but as far as I know, with an innocent sincerity that is oblivious to any unconscious motives. They make sense to me (for now), and seem the natural inference from the existence of God and the relationship between God and man.
These axioms seem to fit in anywhere: On atheism, they reveal how psychologically twisted we are. On theism, they show how “great” God is and how feeble we humans are.
For some time now you have been referring to “morality,” and I would like to ask what you mean by it? Do you actually believe there is morality? If so, where does it come from?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteThere is nothing at all transcendent about "Morality", but it certainly exists, and is as real as tables and chairs.
It (and thus conscience, which is a form of morality) is a completely natural phenomenon which, put simply, denotes our (contingent) preferences and aversions.
Morality is necessary because in very many instances, neutrality and indifference is not a desirable option. We are moral beings because we need to discriminate between various thoughts, actions, and feelings in contingent environmental circumstances.
Our preferences and aversions are symptoms of our organism's perceived (usually unconsciously) conditions of preservation and growth (loosely defined).
It has many sources, such as: physiology, evolutionary history, socialisation, historical contingency, existing power-relations, psychological predisposition, and an assessment (usually unconscious) of our enviornment (physical and social) in relation to our goals, needs, desires etc.
Admittedly, all this is rather vague and general, and doesn't begin to do justice to the enormous complexity involved in some of our relations with "morality". Nevertheless, the most important thing is that it is a wholly natural phenomenon, regardless of the complexity that may (or may not) be involved.
Almost no one, i've long since discovered, likes this idea, and it's easy to understand why this should be so. However, i'm aware of no persuasive argument or evidence which refutes it.
David,
DeleteI don't know any persuasive argument or evidence to refute your definition of morality either. In fact, it makes more sense than theistic-based morality. Have you heard of desirism/desire utilitarianism? Its main proponent is Alonzo Fyfe. His blog is http://atheistethicist.blogspot.com/ if you'd like to find out more.
What follows is my response to your post on Pascal and why you think he's wrong in selecting Christianity as a "cure."
I see that you and Nietzsche mean by "Pascal was ruined by Christianity" that he was consumed by self-contempt. It isn't clear to me how self-contempt ruined him, though. Do you mean that his self-contempt reassured him that mankind has no ability to escape his "unworthiness" except through Christ, so that all other legitimate exits are ignored?
I can identify with Pascal and the analogy you give of Christianity, in experiencing it as "deeply unsettling and painful." But, I don't think that your analogy is completely accurate.
Here is the portion of it I disagree with (possibly because I do not understand the analogy, and hopefully you will correct any misinterpretation):
"I somehow deserve my suffering and that, if I can only purify myself of my immorality, a world of love and protection awaits me (if not here then in some indemonstrable future life)."
Christianity does teach that some people deserve the suffering dealt them, but not all suffering is "deserved." The suffering of Christ (and Catholicism teaches Mary's suffering as well) is not deserved. Much of the suffering Christians are supposed to experience is not punishment alone as it is the means of "purification."
Christianity does teach that we must be "purified of immorality" in order to attain the so-called "beatific vision" of God. But, all of this purifying is done by God (we must co-operate, however). Since we generally fail to become purified in this life, Catholicism (at least this one among the many denominations) teaches the doctrine of purgatory, where Christians who die as imperfect people go to be "perfected" in order to "enter" heaven. The purifying is not entirely in our own hands, otherwise we would be helpless.
I could be a hypocrite here, demanding evidence and arguments against Christianity when any I offer for it would probably be unconvincing and weak (as they seem to be until someone shows otherwise). But, do you have a reason why Christianity is probably false because of its visceral and psychological effects? Or any argument/evidence in general against it?
It seems to me that the self-righteousness that can result from Christianity does not result because of the religion itself but because of the misunderstanding of the people who follow it: Jesus threatens that self-righteous people deserve to go to hell (Mat. 23:33).
What do you mean, specifically, by the "suffering" and "ignorance" caused by Christianity?
I don't know if you saw this earlier question, but what do you think are the real causes of self-loathing etc. on materialism?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteNo, i've never heard of "desire utilitarianism", nor Alonzo Fyfe. I'll try and have a look later when I have time . . .
Nietzsche, being an unrepentant and explicit elitist, first of all recognises Pascal's genius as a thinker who had already excelled in many fields and who is also (at times) capable of taking an unsentimental and realistic view of humanity.
i.e. I'm referring to all those insights and achievements of Pascal that have nothing at all to do with his Christianity. These achievements and abilities show him to be a very great thinker.
Now, enter his commitment to Christianity and what do we find? We find that virtually all of his scientific and mathematical energies are now closed down. Even in the realm of investigating and evaluating the human animal we find a strange juxtaposition: we find numerous passages in Pensées where Pascal displays a thoroughly cool, courageous, unsentimental and realistic perspective on humanity and society, one every bit as "realistic" as thinkers such as Thucydides, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Gibbon etc.
And yet, alongside these explicitly realistic and unsentimental perspectives there is a huge amount of text devoted to affirming Christian texts and value judgements that are anything but cool, unsentimental and realistic.
Pascal is severely tormented by various kinds of "existential" anxieties and wounds, and, by a leap of faith, places all his hopes in Jesus as his only possible redeemer. In the final analysis, he is aware that he has no solid and coherent arguments or evidence in support of this commitment, but he feels that without this leap of faith he is utterly lost. I can imagine him trembling or in tears as he writes many passages.
So Yes, I think that:
a) his commitment to Christ didn't result in any psychological equilibrium and peace for him (regardles of whether Jesus awaited him or not).
And b) his commitment was so strong that he shut the doors to any other potential (i.e. natural, non-theological) appraisal and subsequent escape from his condition.
(Newton, for example, another towering intellect, although very differently constituted than Pascal, spent a great deal of time on theological issues (and alchemy) that, to many of us today, seem utterly pointless).
tbc.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI've just accidentally erased a long post I was just about to send, so please forgive me for the brevity of this one?
Let's look at the question of "egoism". This is one of the reasons why Pascal thinks humanity (all humanity) is corrupt.
Pascal sees the common man and the saint as being both prompted by egoistic desires. He thinks (correctly, I think) that none of our thoughts, feelings and actions take place without a component of "egoism" being involved.
This he thinks (correctly, I believe), applies to every single human being, regardless of how philanthropic, benevolent and self-sacrificial things may appear (even to the subject's own consciousness).
So far, these are descriptive claims about the way things actually are. Now comes the moralism of Christianity.
Even our alleged "virtues", Pascal believes, are contaminated by sin, by the inevitability of self-love. Even our virtues are forms of corruption!
Pascal is deeply repulsed and horrified by this inevitability. He hates and despises this aspect of our nature and sees it as a mark of our intrinsic "corruption".
Nietzsche, however, responds that this way of interpreting existence is utter madness! What Pascal is showing, though he is loathe to see it, is that our "egoism" is part of our innocence. Only by comparing and contrasting ourselves to a fictitious and utterly impossible model of "goodness" and "moral perfection" does this self-denigration of humanity make any sense.
This commitment to the utterly indemonstrable and inaccessible world of alledged transcendence necessitates that everything natural and worldly is viewed with the deepest suspicion or hostility.
Of course, Pascal knows this, intellectually speaking:
"Christianity is strange; it bids man to recognise that he is vile, and even abominable, and bids him want to be like God" (P.351).
Put simply, if the possibility of a fully non-egoistic act is deemed an impossibility (as Pascal and Nietzsche agree that it is) then that is no reason to hate ourselves, rather, it is reason for us to recognise that the traditional conceptual moral opposites we have been affirming need to be abandoned.
If the non-egoistic simply cannot exist in humanity then the "egoistic" can no longer mean what it previously meant when it was deemed to have a polar opposite. i.e. There is no justification (outside allegiance to Christian metaphysics) to adopt a principled objection to and condemnation of, humanity.
There remain, of course, forms and expressions of "egoism" that we deplore and oppose, in ourselves and others, but we oppose and deplore these things without positing the impossibility of a genuinely selfless action.
In simple language, we should accept our embodied "selfishness" and seek more sublimated, mutually advantageous, and prudent expressions of it, and spend no more time condemning what we are, and must necessarily be, in favour of a form of being that we have never (and will never) encountered.
As Nietzsche says, in a rare bit of humour about a deadly serious subject "We no longer admire dentists who pull out the teeth to stop them hurting".
Edarlitrix,
DeleteYou are right to point out that some features of my earlier analogy are not strictly applicable to orthodoxy. However it is the nature of all analogies that, at some point, they break down. It is sufficient, for my present purposes, that very many instances of suffering are either undeserved or disproportionately severe. The fact that there may be exceptions to this general picture doesn't alter the general validity, in my view.
Since none of us, even the most "sinful", chose to be born in the first place, and thus inherit (unavoidably) the consequences of an original sin which we played no part in committing, i'd say that that already makes our "corruption" and "sinfulness" a matter of theological semantics.
Forgive me continually coming back to first principles, but, if I were God and I created a fish (for example), it seems simply incomprehensible to me that they should be condemned and feel ashamed because they can't fly like a bird. Given that I have created them anatomically incapable of flight, and they can see that fact for themselves, why should anyone expect to be "redeemed" and "purified" of their "fish-like" nature? If I (as God) wanted birds, why would I create fish? Why does God create humans and then reject them for being as he made them?
I only ask this rhetorically, the whole enterprise defies sense (for me) . . .
I am not vehemently opposed to Christianity (and certainly not Christians, qua people) although I think it obviously false, for several reasons:
1. In my country (UK), at this particular historical time, there are relatively few toxic manifestations of Christianity, compared to other sources of social ills.
2. Some of the people I love and respect most have been (are) Christians.
3. I think that reality and "truth" is, for the most part, rather ugly, and very difficult, in many instances, to accept and digest fully. Illusions are sometimes necessary and useful in the service of life.
4. Many atheists congratulate themselves on rejecting theism as beneath their intellect, only to rush seamlessly into various non-religious forms of stupidity, superficiality and humbug without a hint of irony or shame.
Nevertheless, I do see it as obviously false and entirely the work of human hands. While it has brought comfort and coherence to many it has also inflicted tremendous suffering and ignorance on those who got in its way.
I think monotheism is the single worst idea that humanity has ever embraced. Religion is a shield, but it is also a sword, and has been used, on countless occasions, to murder, terrify and silence those who (actively or passively) opposed its will.
No doubt, here is where one frequently encounters the "No True Scotsman" fallacy put forward by many, who will claim that none of my criticisms actually apply to it (the true spirit of religion) but only to those who misunderstood religion or who cynically used it as a pretext for their entirely non-religious agendas.
Having read the Bible, I find none of these arguments convincing.
re: "the real causes of Pascal's self-loathing" being entirely in the material world.
DeleteI certainly don't mean anything cryptic or arcane by this statement. I mean simply that there is no invisible, transcendent, purposeful, moral force, acting on the world.
Human psychology is bewilderingly complex and we are still well short of having an adequate account of it. Nevertheless, our lack of omniscience in this area doesn't imply total ignorance of the most likely causal factors involved.
So, using the very broadest brush strokes, we know that everything is dependent upon, and rests upon, the interaction between our individual genetic configuration and the enviornment in which we find ourselves. We know that, statistically speaking, childhood casts a long shadow into adulthood in shaping our character, especially if trauma has occurred. We know that we are fundamentally social animals, as Aristotle long ago observed, and that our sense of self worth is often related to how we are perceived and treated by those around us.
We know that we are essentially erotic animals, and that erotic impulses are often sublimated and disguised in other nominally non-erotic behaviours. We know that most of us strive for distinction, in one form of other, and that we seek the protection, respect and love of significant others. We also know that we can be profoundly wounded and hurt by the actions of others. Schopenhauer's porcupines comes to mind here -
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hedgehog's_dilemma
In short, there are a thousand reasons why we may come to despise ourselves. Most of us have outgrown the need to invoke animism, or witchcraft, or demonic possession, or astrology, or Karma, or failure to appease the God Apollo (to take some crass examples), in order to account for our suffering and misfortunes, and we have done this, to a very large degree because we see that the universe (and the material in it) appears to operate according to the concept of (natural) cause and effect, according to the laws of physics etc (Quantum Theory doesn't help theists here).
Given this increasing naturalistic tendency in the modern world, it seems entirely likely that Pascal's self-loathing came into existence as the result of these completely naturalistic forces (however complex they may be).
Of course, the deist can claim (invoking the increasingly familiar God-of-the-gaps tactic)that God created the laws of physics in the first place, but that's an entirely different subject . . .
David,
DeleteI will keep this (probably correct) interpretation of Pascal in mind when I read the Pensées. Thank you for taking the time to rewrite your deleted post.
Why did we humans invent a realm of “moral perfection” if such a concept is so contrary to everything we know? Why did we set an insane standard for “goodness” we are incapable of attaining? Would you say it is because therefore “everything natural and worldly is viewed with the deepest suspicion or hostility,” and that aids in evolutionary development?
Where does Nietzsche talk about egoism and his interpretation of it?
You already know about original sin, and I could combat your fish analogy by saying that the fish actually used to know how to fly (as the fish-God made him capable of flight), but he decided to swim instead (preferring to “recreate himself” independent of the fish-God’s design) and so he adapted to the water and all of his fish children are born to swim. His new, swimmy nature was passed on to his kids, as traducianism teaches. His kids never knew how to fly, though they had a vague idea of it by looking at the birds. They also could never hope to fly unless the fish God redeemed them from their plight (by becoming a fish that can fly and swim). One problem with this is that, if the flying fish can make himself a swimming fish, why can’t he make himself a flying fish again? Why need the fish-God’s help? And why did the fish-God make the water pond to begin with? Why make swimming a possibility, to heap shame and contempt on the heads of all future fish for their watery prison? It was their dad’s fault. All of this probably only reaffirms how sense-defying original sin is.
I agree with you (after some discussion we already had about the Canaanites) that the Old Testament has many stories involving religious-inflicted suffering. But, the New Testament does not advocate stoning unbelievers, sinners, or spreading Christianity through violence (although some cited Luke 14:23 to justify Christianity-inspired violence). Your criticisms to apply to teaching in the Old Testament, but they don’t apply as far as I can see to the New Testament.
What do you mean when you say quantum theory doesn’t help theists? Have you heard of Alvin Plantinga and his book Where the Conflict Really Lies? Chapters 3 and 4 deal with “divine intervention” and quantum mechanics. I’ll read them soon in case you’d like to know what he has to say (unless you already know).
I now understand what you mean by self-loathing etc. having legitimate causes in a purely material world. I see no reason for now why the theistic explanation of self-loathing as original sin would be better than the naturalistic explanation of self-loathing.
What do you think about Pascal’s observation of how we humans are obsessed with “diversion”? Do you agree with him (supposing I understand what he means by it) that the reason for this is to avoid confronting reality?—nevermind that you both have different views of reality. Did Nietzsche ever address this tendency to “divert” ourselves?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI don't have time now to deal with all of your points.
1. Regarding morality, goodness, nihilism, egoism and the natural world from Nietzsche's perspective - may I suggest you look at the thread on this blog titled Nietzsche, Nihilism and Sensitivity. It's not that long and it'll give you a basically accurate and substantive summary of a certain Nietzschean perspective on things. There are, in my view, some extremely profound and insightful remarks here, but it makes difficult reading, for obvious reasons . . .
2. Fish and Birds. I hear what you're saying, but then the original "fish", being able to fly, weren't really "fish" at all.
3. I see Jesus as being essentially out of place in the Bible. I don't think he belongs there (so to speak). But regardless, I certainly see Jesus as very explicitly advocating pacifism in all our social interactions. i.e. I see the whole "Just War" theology, no matter how conditional and circumspect, as bogus. So yes, my common criticisms of the OT don't apply to Jesus in the Gospels. The texts in the NT that come after the Gospels, however, don't impress me at all morally, but, it's been a very long time since I read them, so i'm not up to speed with many of the details.
4. Quantum Theory: I've heard of Plantinga but never read him. I've seen a couple of videos of him and, well, it's not for me . . .
Quantum Theory sometimes surfaces in various forms of contemporary woo as some sort of loophole out of determinism. This loophole is always sought in the interests of morality and human dignity, but it's a dead end, as far as I can see, because at the levels that really matter to us, as functioning, living beings, Newtonian physics applies.
Nietzsche:"Men were thought of as 'free' so that they could become guilty".
None of our conscious decisions are made at the quantum level, so the indeterminacy that seems to apply there simply isn't relevant to theology (i.e. morality). The "freedom" that apparently pertains at that microscopic level vanishes at higher levels, which is where all morally significant actions take place.
Without the concept of guilt, the whole structure collapses. But guilt requires freedom, and since freedom is hard to reconcile with our deterministic account of Nature, Quantum Theory is embraced as a get-out-of-jail cared (actually, a get-back-into-jail card, i.e. responsibility=freedom=guilt), but it should be apparent that subatomic "randomness" and "indeterminacy" are not moral phenomena and neither are they operative at the level of conscious deliberation.
I find the question of "diversion" fascinating and very important. I'll try and respond tomorrow.
Edarlitrix,
Delete"Diversion" in Pascal?
Nietzsche notes this view of Pascal and basically agrees with it, as do I. A large part of Nietzsche's descriptive (as opposed to normative) project is concerned with our love of error, lies, semblance, superficiality, etc. So much so that for Nietzsche the essence of human existence is essentially its superficiality.
We are predisposed to error, physiologically and psychologically speaking, due to the utility that's often involved in interpreting the world (and ourselves) falsely. This perspective, naturally enough, raises interesting, and perhaps disturbing and belittling, questions regarding the will to truth and the quest for facts, for certainty, for genuine knowledge etc.
These questions are often at the forefront of Nietzsche's mind, and he continually vacillates between seeing the (necessarily ascetic) truth-seeking thinker as a glorious exception among humanity, and, on the other hand, as a symptom of decadence and failure.
"Why did a standard of 'goodness' we are constitutionally incapable of attaining prevail"?
This is a difficult and complex question which is at the very core of Nietzsche's work, but precisely because it is difficult and complex subject it would, perhaps, be wise of me to say nothing at all rather than offer anything here that must necessarily be simplified and incomplete. On the other hand, I don't want to avoid difficult and complex questions for overly purist reasons, and so, on balance, I think it's best to run the risk of saying something stupid and crude rather than saying nothing at all.
What follows, therefore, is just a few preliminary, provisional and simplified remarks.
1. Christianity is premised on the concept of human unworthiness, sin and guilt, and the desire for and the inability of personally acquired redemption.
2. Unworthiness, guilt, sin, and related matters, became dogma in Judaism after the Babylonian and Assyrian enslavements. Rather than abandon a God who seemed to have abandoned his 'chosen people' the Jews chose to explain their failure and humiliation as a failure, not of their God, but of their people, and their lack of strict obedience to God's will.
3. In such a setting, the warrior caste has been obliterated and a distinctly priestly caste is the directing force of the people. This priestly caste, in such dire material conditions, comes increasingly to associate worldly sucess and happiness with depravity, with the gentiles, the unbelievers. This theology is predisposed to disparage the world in favour of transcendence and the concept of a glorious after-life for the pious.
4. Nietzsche sees this whole outlook as an expression of ressentiment (he always uses the French word). Put simply, rather than admit failure, we reinterpret our worldly failure as a moral merit, as a sign of our superiority over those we envy and hate. We define ourselves as being unlike those we oppose, our whole outlook is premised on negation of the earth and worldly success, happiness and appetites. In a word, we accomplish spiritual revenge on those we despise who have power over us.
5. In the figure of Jesus, unworldliness and disdain for worldly sucess reaches an apex. However it is important to note that, for Nietzsche, Jesus himself was, in all likelihood, completely free of ressentiment.
But the world misunderstands Jesus, fails to follow his example, but utilises him for its own ends. The preference for the lowly, the despised, oppressed, marginalised, the mediocre, etc, is attractive to the masses, as is the aversion to the rich, powerful, happy, learned, etc. Again, this is spiritual revenge, as compensatory satisfaction for actual worldly failure.
Contd.
Delete6. Once a critical mass of the population is seduced by this ideology it thereby offers the ambitious, the powerful, the leaders within a population, opportunities for influence and control. The "moral ideal" of selflessness, ironically enough, is often promoted most successfully by those who seek power and influence. Eventually, even Kings and Emperors solemnly proclaim and defend this ideal, because (nominally) promoting the ideal has become an instrument for power and legitimacy.
7. While most people are little troubled by the historical, theological, epistemological, moral and dialectical questions involved in this issue, and operate primarily on practical
grounds, a small minority of more sensitive, serious and intelligent souls take this moral ideal to their hearts and struggle with it (intellectually and practically). Pascal is an example of this sincere and troubled type. But, to repeat, these types are very rare within the general population.
Again, everything i've said here is a very simplified and incomplete summary of things, and should not be taken too literally or seriously.
We find ourselves in a world not of our choosing, frequently unable to bend actuality to our will and desire. The pain, anguish and frustration that arises from this primordial fact often motivates us to disparage actuality in favour of some ideal or other.
Plato, for example, and much subsequent philosophy, takes pride on its devaluation of the testimony of the senses, while modern science has a much less hostile (though still sceptical) view of the testimony of the sense. It is clear, to me at least, which method is preferable in the pursuit of knowledge. But Plato's hostility to actuality is only one instance of this anti-naturalness, which is, in one form or another, very common in humanity.
Orthodox epistemology, in other words, mirrors our general hostility towards the actual in favour of some unobtainable paradigm, so that for Kant, for example, all of our knowledge only relates to the phenomenal world, while the noumenal world and the 'thing-in-itself' is, for him, forever beyond our reach.
In Nietzschean language, we wish to escape the flux of Becoming and dwell in the womb of Being.
Edarlitrix,
Deletere: the idea of a wholly loving God?
As a Christian you won't like or believe any of this, but, given the subject matter and my interest in Nietzsche, I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge his take on this question.
In order to get a fuller account of Nietzsche's view of these matters The Anti-Christ and the Genealogy, at the very least, would need to be read. The Anti-Christ, in particular, contains Nietzsche's most sustained speculation on the nature of Jesus (as the extremity of a certain type of person), and his relation to the external world in general and Christianity in particular.
However, in Beyond Good and Evil Nietzsche writes the following:
"[Woman] - clairvoyant in the world of suffering and, unfortunately, also desirous far beyond her strength to help and save . . . Woman would like to believe that love can achieve anything . . . Alas, whoever knows the heart will guess how poor, stupid, helpless, arrogant, blundering, more apt to destroy than to save is even the best and profoundest love! It is possible that underneath the holy fable and disguise of Jesus' life there lies concealed one of the most painful cases of the martyrdom of knowledge about love: the martyrdom of the most innocent and desirous heart, never sated by any human love; demanding love, to be loved and nothing else . . .; the story of a poor fellow, unsated and insatiable in love, who had to invent hell in order to send to it those who did not want to love him - and who finally, having gained knowledge about human love, had to invent a god who is all love, all ability to love - who has mercy on human love because it is so utterly wretched and unknowing. Anyone who feels that way, who knows this about love - seeks death. But why reflect on such painful things? As long as one does not have to". (BGE.269).
This treats the image of a limitlessly loving God, not as something supported by reason and evidence, but as an entirely visceral and psychological desire. And this desire, this wish and longing for such a being, is rooted in dissatisfaction with actuality, as an escape from the often grubby, tragic and woefully inadequate manifestations of even the best that merely human love has to offer.
Of course, this is a portrait of Jesus that no believer can accept, and, furthermore, it is simply speculation on Nietzsche's part. Nevertheless, it has two important and credible features, in my view; firstly, it implicitly bypasses any theological attempts to justify and defend the notion of a loving God as a genuine possibility as simply not worthy of discussion; and secondly, it offers a motivational theory as origin, that is psychologically credible and consistent with what we already know about human beings; namely, that we often believe in that which we most desire.
David,
Delete1. I’ll check out that blog post you mention soon.
2. You’re on the right track, but it’s the fish who can’t fly that isn’t a fish. It’s “fallen, corrupt” man who is not entirely human. Christianity is about making us “human,” with Jesus as the model for a true human.
3. Jesus may not be a total advocate for peace since he says, “’Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword’” (Mat. 10:34). I doubt he means literal violence and war. Based on the context of the verse (division in the family), he might mean ideological division—which, as we can see, is going on in our conversations. There is also the episode where “Jesus entered the temple and drove out all who sold and bought in the temple, and he overturned the tables of the money-changers and the seats of those who sold pigeons” (Mat. 21:12). Overall, though, he certainly wanted his followers to be peaceful people (even if he was not an entirely peaceful character).
4. Plantinga deals with miracles and quantum theory, and I thought you might be thinking about miracles when you said it doesn’t help theists. Since you weren’t, Plantinga probably won’t add to the conversation.There are even interpretations of quantum theory that make it out to be deterministic, so invoking it to bring in free will is unhelpful. I haven’t seriously studied determinism/free will or their corresponding arguments, so until I do all I can say is that I agree that with determinism, the concept of guilt is pointless. Do you have a blog post on here or do you know the specific writings by Nietzsche where he deals with determinism and free will?
Could you explain why, at least to Nietzsche, the truth-seeking thinker is “a symptom of decadence and failure”?
Where or in which of Nietzsche’s works does he deal with the problem of why “a standard of 'goodness' we are constitutionally incapable of attaining prevail"?
Does Nietzsche anywhere explain why we humans, of all the animals (so it seems), “wish to escape the flux of Becoming and dwell in the womb of Being”? Do you mind explaining what that means in non-Nietzschan language?
I understand the idea of God as a fulfillment of a psychological desire, but that interpretation of Jesus by Nietzsche is confusing, especially the phrase “Anyone who feels that way, who knows this about love - seeks death.” I don’t get what he’s saying. Could you please explain what he means? Obviously, I disagree with this description of Jesus. Most of all I find it contrived—but, if we have to explain Jesus as a mere human in a godless universe, Nietzsche’s view might work.
You also say a credible feature of Nietzsche’s method here is how he “bypasses any theological attempts to justify and defend the notion of a loving God as a genuine possibility as simply not worthy of discussion.” That sounds like an a priori rejection of made without thinking things over (however, his reasons for “a priori” rejecting the possibility of a loving God might be elsewhere—brutality of the natural world etc.).
What are your views on Jesus? Do you agree with Nietzsche?
DeleteEdarlitrix,
DeleteYour questions here regarding Nietzsche are important, and they are certainly issues he explores in most of his work. However, it would require several very lengthy posts in order for me to even begin to do justice to his views on these matters.
May I again suggest you have a look at the short Nietzsche, Nihilism and Sensitivity thread? This won't answer all of your questions, but it'll serve as a good staring point. After reading that, feel free to ask any related question you like.
Free will?
Nietzsche denies free will. Are you thinking of determinism and free will purely with regards to morality, or are you posing the question also as a matter of "detached" philosophical/scientific interest?
If you're looking for a piece of Nietzsche text on the subject, see the chapter 'The Four Great Errors' in Twilight of the Idols.
For Nietzsche and Jesus: see The Anti-Christ 24-36. I must warn you that some of Nietzsche's language here will be very offensive to most Christians.
The BGE quotation above: what, exactly, do you find confusing?
What Jesus most wants/needs, he can't find in actuality, so that death offers two possibilities to anyone suffering in this way, one positive, the other negative:(i)the negative attraction is simply a release and escape from the pain of being alive into nothingness; (ii) the positive attraction is to escape the pain of being alive by actively seeking death, in order to dwell in a hoped-for world of bliss.
A loving God?
This is really the "problem of evil" in different language. There are certainly a priori reasons for rejecting such a notion, the co-dependency of the concepts of good and evil being the principal one, but this is overwhelmingly an empirical claim. The one thing we can all agree on is the ubiquity of suffering, on an unimaginable scale, not only among humanity, but throughout the animal kingdom.
It would be more credible, but equally wrong, to interpret existence as evidently the work of some wicked God, or simply an amoral, aesthetic God; both of these conceptions track more faithfully the world as we actually know it than the notion of a loving God, which doesn't track actuality at all!
But neither a wicked nor an amoral, aesthetic God, (to say nothing of a non-existent God)edifies us moderns, and so, in a Leibniz-like fashion, we entertain every avenue of thought that will render the world digestible to us.
In no other knowledge-seeking discipline I can think of does this strategy operate; in no other academic realm do we routinely disparage the evidence of the senses in favour of an indemonstrable, unfalsifiable, and untestable hypothesis. Here we don't really want the truth; here we want edification, meaning, purpose, dignity, power, consolation, comfort, happiness, and if the universe won't naturally grant us these things, we can always interpret the universe so that it appears to.
My views on Jesus?
My views are similar to those of Nietzsche in The Anti-Christ, 28-36. I have no way of knowing, what, if anything, actually occurred, but i'm prepared to provisionally believe that an extraordinarily courageous, dignified, and loving man found himself among a community of largely ignorant, bigoted and violent fools. My guess is that a few people were greatly impressed by him and others were simply fascinated, bewildered and mesmerised by his example. I see him almost entirely as a "man of action", a man defined by his deeds, and not as a "thinker".
I think Nietzsche's speculation on the character of Jesus (see esp. The Anti-Christ, 28-26) is broadly credible, as a psychological and physiological possibility, but that's not to say that I think it's actually true. I don't think there's any way of determining the truth here, all we can do is speculate.
David,
DeleteI read the thread you suggested and plan on reading the rest of the them soon.
My question about Nietzsche and free-will had to do with both morality and a "detached" interest. I will see about reading the passage.
You ended up resolving my confusion about the BGE passage. I didn't understand how he could relate love with seeking death, but now I get it.
I now see good reason behind why Nietzsche would a priori reject God.
I plan on reading The Anti-Christ sometime, then (I may as well read all of Nietzsche's writings).
Edarlitrix,
DeleteThe Anti-Christ has some great things in it, and it's his most sustained assault on Christianity. However, it also contains some very regrettable features. Nietzsche is not a systematic or consistent thinker, and frequently the brilliant and good is mixed up with the stupid and bad. A lot of unpicking is required if he is to be used wisely.
Great though the Anti-Christ is, it's often shrill and untidy. Daybreak, in my view, is a superior work and the place where anyone new to Nietzsche should start. Of all Nietzsche's works Daybreak and Beyond Good and Evil are probably my favourites.
David,
DeleteI'll save reading Anti-Christ for later then. Do you have a preferred translation of Daybreak?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteActually, probably the best place to start would be Michael Tanner's Nietzsche. It's a little book, but far superior to most.
If, after that, you want to read Nietzsche himself, Daybreak or The Gay Science would be a good place to start. Translations by Kaufmann or Hollingdale are fine.
“There is something self-evidently ludicrous about us puny little humans thinking we can know God's nature through a priori methods. It's no small matter that Pascal often refers to Him as ‘The Hidden God’”.
ReplyDeleteWell, here is the Catholic catechism’s ideas about the matter. Maybe it can clarify our ideas about God and human thinking.
III. Coming to knowledge of God http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PB.HTM
37 In the historical conditions in which he finds himself, however, man experiences many difficulties in coming to know God by the light of reason alone:
Though human reason is, strictly speaking, truly capable by its own natural power and light of attaining to a true and certain knowledge of the one personal God, who watches over and controls the world by his providence, and of the natural law written in our hearts by the Creator; yet there are many obstacles which prevent reason from the effective and fruitful use of this inborn faculty. For the truths that concern the relations between God and man wholly transcend the visible order of things, and, if they are translated into human action and influence it, they call for self-surrender and abnegation. the human mind, in its turn, is hampered in the attaining of such truths, not only by the impact of the senses and the imagination, but also by disordered appetites which are the consequences of original sin. So it happens that men in such matters easily persuade themselves that what they would not like to be true is false or at least doubtful.13
38 This is why man stands in need of being enlightened by God's revelation, not only about those things that exceed his understanding, but also "about those religious and moral truths which of themselves are not beyond the grasp of human reason, so that even in the present condition of the human race, they can be known by all men with ease, with firm certainty and with no admixture of error".14
So, as Pascal says, a good deal of God would be quite hidden without “revelation” if there is such a thing. A good deal is hidden even with it.
This portion, “How can we speak about God,” you might find interesting:
IV. How Can We Speak about God? http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__PC.HTM
40 Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking.
41 All creatures bear a certain resemblance to God, most especially man, created in the image and likeness of God. the manifold perfections of creatures - their truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God. Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures’ perfections as our starting point, "for from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their Creator".15
42 God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language of everything in it that is limited, imagebound or imperfect, if we are not to confuse our image of God --"the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the invisible, the ungraspable"-- with our human representations.16 Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God.
43 Admittedly, in speaking about God like this, our language is using human modes of expression; nevertheless it really does attain to God himself, though unable to express him in his infinite simplicity. Likewise, we must recall that "between Creator and creature no similitude can be expressed without implying an even greater dissimilitude";17 and that "concerning God, we cannot grasp what he is, but only what he is not, and how other beings stand in relation to him.”
Edarlitrix,
DeleteGiven the amount of material and the actual details of the content you're offering me here, it seems reasonable for me to assume that you find this material impressive, if not conclusive. I'm afraid I can't concur. The whole thing is, I suspect, deliberately incoherent and contradictory.
I'll just stick to a few points:
1. It begins with the demonstrably false claim that, via reason alone, it is possible to acquire "true and certain knowledge" of a monotheistic, interventionist God.
2. It uses the concept of "original sin" as an explanation of aspects of human nature that it doesn't like. This reminds me of the Marxist concept of "false consciousness" (a concept which has its roots in monotheistic dogma and authority), whereby any serious criticism of Marxism is simply dismissed as the product of an enlightened and reactionary consciousness.
In plain language - "those who disagree or oppose our understanding of revelation are in error, and their error consists in opposing us". Here we have the desire for power cloaking itself in the language of modesty and humility.
3. It talks of the existence of certain "moral truths" which at present "can be known by all men with ease, with firm certainty . . ."
This is transparently absurd. The whole of western moral philosophy testifies to the fact that no alledged "moral truth" has ever gained consensus.
4. It claims that all sentient beings have "a resemblance to God" and mentions the "manifold perfections of creatures", and that "their truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God. Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures’ perfections as our starting point . . . "
How anyone can apply the words "perfection" (to say nothing of the "truth", "goodness", and beauty" of all animals) to the killing fields of the natural world is beyond me.
The author(s) don't appear to know that almost all species have become extinct. What concept of "perfection" have they in mind? The teeth of lions, for example, while not "perfect", are very well suited to ripping into the flesh of their prey, but I doubt their prey endorse and celebrate this fact as a piece of "perfection".
We don't need to invoke Darwin's troubling encounter with the Ichneumondae to see that their depiction of the natural world bears not the slightest resemblance to reality.
5.If the nature of God is to be inferred from the attributes, experiences and relations that obtain on earth between his creatures and the external world (as the above suggests) then the obvious answer is, i'm afraid, staring us in the face and it isn't at all edifying.
To be continued . . .
I'm sorry, but I simply can't take any of the above "arguments" or sentiments seriously; and now would be a good time, I think, to re-introduce Nietzsche back into this discussion, in order to remind us of a few salient facts regarding mankind and all moralistic metaphysics, Christianity included:
Delete" 'According to nature' you want to live? O you noble Stoics, what deceptive words these are! Imagine a being like nature, wasteful beyond measure, indifferent beyond measure, without purposes and consideration, without mercy and justice, fertile and desolate and uncertain at the same time; imagine indifference itself as a power - how could you live according to this indifference? Is that not precisely wanting to be other than this nature? Is not living - estimating, preferring, being unjust, being limited - wanting to be different?
"And supposing your imperative 'live according to nature' meant at bottom as much as 'live according to life' - how could you not do that? Why make a principle of what you yourselves are and must be?
"In truth, the matter is altogether different: while you pretend rapturously to read the canon of your law in nature, you want something opposite, you strange actors and self-deceivers! Your pride wants to impose your morality, your ideal, on nature - even on nature - and incorporate them in her; you demand that she be nature 'according to the Stoa', and you would like all existence to exist only after your own image - as an immense eternal glorification and generalization of Stoicism.
"For all your love of truth, you have forced yourselves so long, so persistently, so rigidly-hypnotically to see nature the wrong way, namely Stoically, that you are no longer able to see her differently. And some abysmal arrogance finally still inspires you with the insane hope that because you know how to tyrannize over yourselves - Stoicism is self tyranny - nature, too, lets herself be tyrannized . . .
"But this is an ancient, eternal story: what formerly happened with the Stoics still happens today, too, as soon as any philosophy begins to believe in itself. It always creates the world in its own image; it cannot do otherwise. Philosophy is this tyrannical drive itself, the most spiritual will to power, to the "creation of the world," to the causa prima". (BGE.9).
Replace the word "Stoicism" here with "Christianity" and nothing substantive changes.
Correction: in #2 above regarding the Marxist doctrine of false consciousness, it should have read "Unenlightened".
DeleteDavid,
DeleteYou are correct that I found the material impressive and some of it convincing. I don’t see how the writers of the catechism were DELIBERATELY contradictory and incoherent, if at all. They could be innocently oblivious to any sort of contradiction.
1. The claim that “human reason is, strictly speaking, truly capable by its own natural power and light of attaining to a true and certain knowledge of the one personal God, who watches over and controls the world by his providence” is one difficult for me to believe. It’s only when they add “there are many obstacles which prevent reason from the effective and fruitful use of this inborn faculty” and what follows does their claim that we can attain knowledge of God through reason seem remotely plausible. Of course, they could have slipped that part in so people who remain unconvinced by “reason” are just slaves to the obstacles that keep them from knowing God. Frankly, none of that is demonstrably true, it just follows from Christianity once one demonstrates that is true through some other principle, like the Resurrection.
2. “In plain language – ‘those who disagree or oppose our understanding of revelation are in error, and their error consists in opposing us’. Here we have the desire for power cloaking itself in the language of modesty and humility.” I’m not sure that it’s demonstrable that all of their language of modesty and humility is just a cloak hiding their desire for power. That sounds as demonstrable as the claim that “the human mind, in its turn, is hampered in the attaining of such truths . . . by disordered appetites which are the consequences of original sin.” Do you see the desire for power as a reason to discredit what they’re saying? That sounds like ad hominem. You have a good analogy with Marxism, but why should the insincerity of Catholics or Marxists disprove their explanations for all dissension?
3. You are right that there is no consensus on moral truths, etc. How does that reveal some transparent absurdity in the Catholic’s claim that there are "moral truths" which at present "can be known by all men with ease, with firm certainty . . ."? They made sure to explain that the reason why there is no consensus or firm certainty is because of “disordered appetites which are the consequences of original sin.” Most men go down the alley of “original sin” rather than unflinchingly search for the “moral truths” Catholics profess. I myself am inclined to agree with the Catholic view here.
4. I don’t think the Catholics are implying that there are no flaws to creation. Why exaggerate the flaws at the expense of any “perfections”? That seems as mistaken as exaggerating the perfections at the expense of the flaws. They don’t mean to say the entirety of creation is perfect. They mean bits and pieces of creatures are isolated “perfections.” I don’t see, though, how we humans can know which aspect of a creature is a perfection and which aspect a flaw. One could perceive even what most consider “beauty” as a monstrosity, like Edvard Munch sees the sunset in his painting the Scream:
DeleteI went along the road with two friends—
The sun set
Suddenly the sky became blood—and I felt the breath of sadness
A tearing pain beneath my heart
I stopped—leaned against the fence—deathly tired
Clouds over the fjord of blood dripped reeking with blood
My friends went on but I just stood trembling with an open wound
in my breast trembling with anxiety I heard a huge extraordinary
scream pass through nature. (http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/excerpts/munch.asp).
But one could even see horrors like the Ichneumondae as beautiful. Guy Sircello “seemed to be able to find beauty almost everywhere, though he certainly did not think everything is beautiful. In the course of finding beauty even in Charles Beaudelaire’s infamous collection of poems, The Flowers of Evil, Sircello made this rather memorable observation: ‘beauty can bloom in the very anus of ugliness’” (book review by Charles Taliaferro on The Poetics of Evil). Undoubtedly that can apply to the likes of Ichneumondae and lion’s teeth.
My point here is that the Catholic’s mention of “truth, beauty, perfection” etc. of creatures can’t be proved or disproved. Beauty and ugliness seem to be matters of perspective, helplessly up for grabs. One simply has to presuppose there is an actual, accurate perspective on the matter, that it is the Catholic one, and then use that perspective as a starting point for talking about God’s beauty, etc. Obviously, there’s no point in trying to use nature as a starting point for talking about God if we have the wrong view of nature—supposing there is a right view of it.
5. I agree with you here. I don’t think we would be accurate in our attempts to assess God in light of creation. We could misinterpret creation, or incorrectly apply it to God. I don’t know if it’s wise to try and “learn about God” through nature: 1. We are intellectually unreliable 2. Nature is corrupt—both on Christianity in general, not just Catholicism.
Nietzsche’s quote is impressive, and I think in some cases it could be accurate—we just “would like all existence to exist only after [our] own image”—but I don’t see how this falsifies the Stoic’s, the Christian’s, the moralistic metaphysician’s etc. view of nature. He could still be right, however driven by the will to power he is. Do you apply this to yourself? Do you think that your interpretation of things is driven by a will to power?
Edarlitrix,
Delete1. Either reason alone is, or it is not, capable of attaining this "knowledge". If it is, as they claim, then let the rest of the world see the evidence of this momentous achievement. The non-appearance of this feat is itself proof that the claim is groundless, and has nothing whatever to do with so-called "disordered appetites" (a very convenient doctrine).
If another organisation or competing religion were to claim that, were it not for mankind's ineradicable "disordered appetites", every man, woman and child could, for example: climb Mount Everest in under an hour, fly like a bird to the moon, swim the Pacific in five minutes, heal every wound without any medical training, play the piano better than Mozart, correct Einstein's equations, etc, why shouldn't we believe it?
What's to stop a competing religion from claiming that it is Catholicism's "disordered appetites" that are preventing it from accepting the true (other) religion?
2. It is an incontestable fact that the Church seeks worldly power. The desire for power doesn't itself invalidate any truth claim, but it means that the evidence supposedly supporting these truth claims need to be rigorously scrutinised by the rest of us.
3. Then simply let those without "disordered appetites" (an extraordinarily presumptuous and censorious characterisation) reveal to the rest of humanity what methodology exactly they practised in order to arrive at these alleged moral truths?
"Revelations" are not socially credible arguments or evidence, since they provide no means to adjudicate between the conflicting "revelations" of others; to say nothing of those who would reject any alledged "revelation" as self-evidently non-binding on the rest of us.
4. There's no need here for any single, universal standard of "perfection". If any individual sentient being innocently or disproportionately suffers, then that suffering is a real and concrete reality for that creature.
If the Ichneumondae, for example, is to be considered as "beautiful", then there is no principled reason why every conceivable form of cruelty, agony, sadism and torture should not be also viewed as "beautiful".
These are instances of "beauty" that echo Nietzsche's claim in his first book The Birth of Tragedy, that if there is a God then its an aesthetic one, and not a moral one.
5. I don't think that Nature is in the slightest degree "corrupt". That is a value judgement with no rational or empirical foundation whatever.
It's true that we are far from omniscient, but that is no reason, as they say, to make the best an enemy of the better! We can, and have, made much intellectual progress in understanding the universe. In addition, if our rationality and empiricism is to be seen as "unreliable", then the same may be said regarding the veracity of people's "revelations".
The Stoic and Christian falsify Nature because Nature is indifferent, as Nietzsche makes clear. Nature neither knows nor cares, nature just is.
The (psychological) will to power is too subtle and complex to get into here. I don't know if you are familiar with Nietzsche's writing on the subject, but there is a thread here on the blog devoted to it if you're interested.
David,
Delete1. I suspect Catholics/Christians who believe reason alone can get us to a knowledge of God's existence and nature would appeal to these arguments (you might be familiar with them already): 1. Kalam Cosmological argument (which would prove that God is personal and powerful). 2. Argument from contingency (which would prove God is a necessary being). 3. Moral argument (which would prove that God's nature/character corresponds to what we classify "good"). The problem is that not everybody thinks these arguments are convincing. Then the Catholics could claim those who find them unconvincing are following their "disordered appetites." But, what about Christians who aren't convinced by them? I for one am leaning towards the idea that these arguments are useless. And what about non-Christians who find these arguments sound (though not necessarily convincing)? (as an atheist told WLC http://www.reasonablefaith.org/coming-to-love-god). The examples you give of counter-claims manage to put the Catholic back where he started. For now, I agree with you here.
2. I think that, in order to avoid biases that can affect our own judgment, it would be better to completely disregard the actual or perceived motivation behind anyone's claim. We should rigorously scrutinize all evidence and claims no matter who says the claim, or why. So, Catholics shouldn't automatically frown upon a non-Christian's claims and evidence just because they suspect disordered appetites are affecting it.
3. Revelations don't prove anything on their own, I agree. But, if there is something demonstrable, or rational, or constituting evidence that would lead to the conclusion "such-and-such revelation is true," then those revelations could serve as premises for something. If the resurrection of Jesus of Nazareth actually happened, then it is highly probable that he is a reliable source of revelation.
4. When I was talking of beauty, I meant aesthetic and not moral beauty. It sounds like you may have been meaning moral beauty. So, we may have been talking past each other. I agree that there is not much moral beauty in the world. There is no moral beauty in sadism, although in some perverse way there could be "aesthetic" beauty.
5. I agree that there is no rational or empirical way to show nature is corrupt. My claim that it is corrupt is based on biblical revelation, which perhaps could have some external empirical or rational support as I explain in point 3.
I see now that I've been holding some contradictory views: "intellectual unreliability" and that we can show things are probably true with our "reason and evidence." I think "intellectual unreliability" should be rephrased as "unreliability" and then these views are not necessarily incompatible. We do resort to misusing reason and evidence to support our beliefs and reject others. In that way WE and our INTERPRETATIONS of the evidence can be unreliable, although our reason and evidence are NOT necessarily unreliable. That's when peer-review can come in and help reveal weaknesses.
I concede that Christianity claims "the whole creation groans" because of its "corruption" (Rom. 8:22), and this implies that nature knows and cares--unless in some way the verse does not mean that literally. It appears to me that nature neither knows nor cares. But, it also appears to me that there is no evidence for or against the notion that it doesn't care. The same goes for its "groaning in corruption," unless we take biblical revelation as evidence.
I'll check out the thread soon, I hope.
Edarlitrix,
Delete3. Yes indeed, but the $64,000 question is how does anyone reconcile this approach with your statement in #2 above and arrive at the conclusion that the revelation is just as it seems?
This has never been satisfactorily done for any alledged revelation, which is why before long we usually have to invoke concepts to remind the faithful that God transcends logic, reason and the limits of current empiricism.
That's, after all, why the concept of "faith" has any meaning at all. At some points, the believer simply has to make those leaps of faith, precisely because reason and evidence alone don't suffice to ground the claims.
4. Obviously, I don't believe in the Gods of ancient Greece, but the reality of human life and all history conforms more consistently to the character of these Gods. It's all nonsense, of course, but it does, in a naive fashion, explain why the world is as it is, far more credibly than any monotheistic and moralistic alternative i'm aware of.
The "problem of evil" as a conceptual, intellectual puzzle, simply vanishes in this model, because everything we see and experience in life conforms to our understanding of these Gods.
5. I wouldn't at all recommend to anyone Nietzsche as a substitute for Jesus, or theism generally, because Nietzsche, although at times brilliant, is also riddled with serious deficiencies and faults. However, if you can get hold of a copy of The Gay Science check out section 109 regarding humanity and Nature (i'm in agreement with virtually every word of this section).
I think there's plenty of evidence that Nature neither knows nor cares, but, it must also be admitted that this evidence (which is omnipresent) cannot be proven to be conclusive! Why? Because the theist or deist can always remind the atheist that appearance is not always synonymous with reality, and that behind and above the visible order of things a higher truth resides which will reveal that the appearance of a deaf and dumb Nature was due to our inability to understand and perceive the transcendent reality.
But an atheist like myself would simply counter that nothing whatsoever can be conclusively proved beyond the slightest doubt, but to take refuge in this "fact" is to set the epistemic bar very low indeed, since we can't rule out conclusively any point of view whatsoever.
What's required, I would argue, is for the strength of our beliefs to be proportionate to the evidence supporting them. And seen in this light, if Nature looks, feels, tastes and smells like it's unaware and unconcerned with human purposes, then it probably is.
When I say this, of course, i'm referring to Nature on the macroscopic scale. At more localised levels, Nature actually "cares" a great deal. Humans care, and I certainly care, but we must not make the mistake of confusing the character of the Parts with the character of the Whole. Many of the "parts" do care, that's obvious, but the "whole" neither knows nor cares about anything, including itself!
David,
DeleteWith regards to reconciling point 3 with point 2, there are sadly some aspects of revelation (even revelation itself) that end up being tossed into the bin of “just have faith.” The one exception I can think of now is the resurrection of Christ. Many books by scholars and historians have been written on the resurrection, treating it like other historical claims, as N.T. Wright should be doing in his “Christian Origins and the Question of God” series (I don’t necessarily consider his work conclusive, not having read it myself).
4. I never thought about it that way. That is something to think about for sure, thanks for bringing it up. I honestly am wondering why I have not seen any Christian “apologists” dealing with these kinds of objections.
5. I checked out the passage from the Gay Science you suggested. It makes so much sense, any attempt to argue against it would be like arguing against a brick wall. For now, I would say that’s the way the world is if God doesn’t exist. Have you heard of Thomas Nagel? His latest book (which I haven’t read), Mind and Cosmos, seems contrary to your own views (since you agree with Nietzsche’s passage in the Gay Science). I thought you might like to know it exists. He is an atheist, so no religious convictions are influencing his perspective.
You make a solid case for Nature’s indifference. What do you mean by care when you say humans “care”—unlike the whole of Nature? What do you and Nietzsche think about why humans “care”? Do you think animals could “care”?
Edarlitrix,
Deletere:the Resurrection.
But this response doesn't answer the methodological $64,000 question, for a very obvious reason. Let me quote Nietzsche, who was an accomplished philologist:
"What do I care for the contradictions of 'tradition'? How can legends of saints be called 'tradition' at all! The stories of the saints are the most ambiguous literature in existence: to apply to them scientific procedures when no other records are extant seems to me wrong in principle -mere idle learning". (A.28).
re: The "conceptual problem of evil".
Historians and anthropologists have revealed to us that humanity has believed in (i.e. created) literally thousands of religions. And, one of the startling things about this fact is that very few of these religions have any concept of a moral God(s) at work in the universe.
I think this is a very sobering and illuminating fact. It tells us, among other things, that the conceptual "problem of evil" is a very contingent social/historical phenomenon, and that this problem simply doesn't exist for most of our ancestors.
Only by positing the notion of a flawlessly "moral" God does this question arise. And because every piece of natural evidence and experience seems to contradict this notion, an elaborate and obscurantist theology is required in order to square this self-imposed circle.
I'm aware of, but haven't read any Nagel. I know that his latest book has received much criticism from certain naturalist thinkers (i'll reference some of the negative reviews of his latest book if you'd like?), but, being unfamiliar with his work i'm not in a position to comment.
Why does anything "care"?
DeleteWe care, generally speaking, because we're here, because we exist. If our ancestors, didn't "care" then in all likelihood, we wouldn't have been born, and we wouldn't survive as a species.
We "care", as individuals, for the same reasons I gave earlier about why we have "morality". We care because indifference and neutrality, in very many situations, will bring us immense pain and suffering.
Whatever you may think of Richard Dawkins, for example, as a critic of theism, his strictly scientific work (e.g. The Selfish Gene) shows with admirable clarity why all living things "care".
We humans are ourselves part of Nature, and the capabilities we have that allow our species to continue over countless millennia, in often inhospitable environments, are all naturally acquired.
Here we have the illusion of "Design" by means of natural selection.
We, like every other living organism currently occupying the earth, don't come as a blank slate into the world. We inherent, quite naturally and unavoidably, a whole host of capabilities and predispositions, desires and aversions, anatomical structures, brain chemistry, etc, depending on our species.
The gazelles have fleet-of-foot and astonishing agility, while the lions chasing them have large teeth, claws and musculature.
The gazelles may be forgiven for supposing that the deity that made them was concerned with their welfare, because they have been naturally endowed with many features that allow them to elude predators. Equally, the lions may share the same conceit, because they too seem to have been "designed" to catch and kill gazelles.
But when we stand back we see, sadly, that this state of affairs doesn't exist because two opposing deities have taken an interest in lions and gazelles, or that a monotheistic God has contradictory tendencies regarding these creatures.
What we see, rather, is that the same impersonal, purposeless natural forces have manifested themselves in two different ways, and that a plague, flood, drought, or asteroid may, at any time, obliterate both of these species without "reason". Because, at the macroscopic level, Nature is indifferent. Not cruel, malicious, evil, or corrupt, simply unaware and unknowing.
Generally speaking, the Mother of any species is biologically predisposed to have certain maternal instincts towards her offspring. Why? Because without these protective and nurturing instincts and predispositions, the offspring are more likely to die, and die young.
And, being dead, their genetic material is not therefore continued into future generations. Thus the I-couldn't-care-less-about-my-offspring behaviour is rare in nature simply because this behaviour isn't favoured by natural selection, because it's statistically unlikely to result in healthy offspring who will reach sexual maturity and propagate the species. Thus the world becomes increasingly filled with creatures who care for their offspring, etc . . .
Nietzsche's answer to this question would depend upon what mood he was in at the time of writing. If he was in the full thrall of the will to power mood, he would say that we "care", ultimately, because "caring" allows us to experience the feeling of power, which is what, deep down, we most want.
For a very brief outline of this view, see, for example, The Gay Science, section 13.
But, I must emphasise that nothing i've said here comes close to being adequate to the subject matter. "Caring" generally, and even the "will to power" in Nietzsche, are both far too complex to be captured in a few words by me. All i've done here is attempt to highlight the (theoretical) direction of travel and to suggest that "caring" is not a primary and fundamental property of the universe, but an emergent property. But, it's no less important and valuable for all that . . .
David,
DeleteI don’t see how Nietzsche’s quote on saints applies to the resurrection. After all, the sources of information on Jesus are considered by historians to be generally reliable. They don’t require a non-Christian source in order for the information in the gospels to be historical.
Bart Ehrman, for example, says, “The resurrection of Jesus lies at the heart of Christian faith. Unfortunately, it also is a tradition about Jesus that historians have difficulty dealing with. As I said, there are a couple of things that we can say for certain about Jesus after his death. We can say with relative certainty, for example, that he was buried. I say with relative certainty because historians do have some questions about the traditions of Jesus' burial. . . . Some scholars have argued that it's more plausible that in fact Jesus was placed in a common burial plot, which sometimes happened, or was, as many other crucified people, simply left to be eaten by scavenging animals (which also happened commonly for crucified persons in the Roman Empire). But the accounts are fairly unanimous in saying (the earliest accounts we have are unanimous in saying) that Jesus was in fact buried by this fellow, Joseph of Arimathea, and so it's relatively reliable that that's what happened.
We also have solid traditions to indicate that women found this tomb empty three days later. This is attested in all of our gospel sources, early and late, and so it appears to be a historical datum. As so I think we can say that after Jesus' death, with some (probably with some) certainty, that he was buried, possibly by this fellow, Joseph of Arimathea, and that three days later he appeared not to have been in his tomb (Bart Ehrman, From Jesus to Constantine: A History of Early Christianity, Lecture 4: "Oral and Written Traditions about Jesus" [The Teaching Company, 2003].)
Bart Ehrman is non-Christian, but he takes the gospels seriously (e.g. “solid traditions,” “relatively reliable,” “some certainty”).
You’ve elsewhere mentioned that the invention of an all-loving God is motivated by a psychological desire. Why are Judaism, Islam, and Christianity(and possibly others I’m unaware of) the only religions out of thousands that exhibit “this desire, this wish and longing for such a being . . . rooted in dissatisfaction with actuality, as an escape from the often grubby, tragic and woefully inadequate manifestations of even the best that merely human love has to offer”? Why invent a God seemingly contrary to everything we know and that is incomprehensible, etc.?
I would like to read the negative reviews of Nagel’s book.
Alright, thanks for that explanation of caring. It makes a lot of sense. I will hopefully get around to reading The Gay Science passage you mention.
Edarlitrix,
Deletere: The Resurrection: Nothing would have been easier than for Jesus to appear, after crucifixion, in clear sight of the soldiers who killed him, the priests and Pharisees who wanted his death, and Pilate, to name but a few.
But for some reason, God chose to demonstrate his power over natural death by showing himself to only a few people, for a very brief amount of time, far from the most publicly verifiable gaze. This makes no sense at all.
God, the supreme being of the universe, the creator of galaxies and atoms and everything else in-between, takes on human form and suffers the most appaling tortures in order to redeem humanity, nevertheless chooses to only reveal his greatest miracle to a few common people in an obscure part of the earth. Moreover, it never occurs to any of the disciples to ask the resurrected Jesus "Why are you now leaving us and the world? Surely now is the time to reveal yourself and your message to the widest possible audience, so that they, and future generations, will have a historical record, from a diverse number of sources, testifying to your divinity"? etc etc etc . . .
No doubt, theologians have nifty answers to such questions, but I find none of them remotely convincing. We return, once again, to the questions at the heart of 'The Grand Inquisitor' passage, and the will of God to remain, in spite of Jesus's suffering and resurrection, an essentially hidden God.
re: Ehrman
Who is the source of these "accounts" he mentions and how long after Jesus's death do they surface?
I would think the phrase "solid tradition" is a contradiction in terms as regards the tradition's assertions. I don't doubt that many "traditions" are "solid", if by that we mean that within certain communities belief in the reality of X has been affirmed by successive generations within that community. But that only puts things on a par with, for example, Zeus and Achilles. No one denies that many Greeks sincerely believed in the reality of these figures, but that doesn't give the "solid tradition" any epistemic weight.
Ehrman also mentions the "solid tradition" of a few women finding an empty tomb 3 days after Jesus's death, and because this is common to all four gospels he then categorises it as a "historical datum"!
Correct me if i'm wrong, but I was under the impression that the earliest of the Gospels were written roughly 40 years after Jesus's death? It should be obvious that none of this constitutes serious and reliable evidence, and an empty tomb doesn't equate to a miracle having taken place. Also, I would have thought that if Ehrman wasn't a Christian that was itself proof that, for him, no resurrection actually occurred.
Negative Nagel reviews; here's three:
(i)
http://www.bostonreview.net/BR37.6/elliott_sober_thomas_nagel_mind_cosmos.php
(ii)
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2013/feb/07/awaiting-new-darwin/?pagination=false
(iii)
http://www.thenation.com/article/170334/do-you-only-have-brain-thomas-nagel?page=full#
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI'm no theologian, but I personally think of the fundamental message and acts of Jesus as largely unique among the Abrahamic religions. i.e. resist not evil, love your enemies, love one another etc.
As i've said before, I don't think this message really belongs in any organised, monotheistic religion that i'm aware of. I think it's purely an accident of history and geography that Jesus was incorporated into what became "Christianity". I think "Christianity" makes use of Jesus's name, but it's really the invention of Paul and later figures and has very little to do with Jesus (as I see him).
So, I don't think it's true that other monotheistic religions exhibit the same desire as Jesus for a wholly loving God. If you think i've said that then I haven't been sufficiently clear. In my posts of 19/2/13 I tried to answer this question schematically in seven points.
To simplify: for a very few, such as Jesus, the idea of a loving God was a consequence of an extreme susceptibility to suffer, but for the overwheliming majority, it grew out of expediency and ressentiment. It was (and is) a form of spiritual revenge, a way of interpreting failure as success, impotency as power, and hatred as righteous etc.
One of the saddest things I ever read was that many Franciscan monks, after the death of St. Francis, were among the most eager persecutors in the Inquisition. Nietzsche never mentions this fact, but it is entirely consistent with his general appraisal of humanity. People like St. Francis really are full of love, gentleness and good-will, but for most, "goodness" is only a sham, an empty word.
But being dissatisfied with actuality is a different, but related, phenomenon, and this is a rather widespread judgement that applies far beyond the Abrahamic religions. Indeed, it is hard to think of any civilisation or religion that, as a matter of doctrine, has ever preached affirmation of actuality (a few mystics aside). I certainly can't think of one.
Put simply: what religion has ever had at its core a message such as the following:
"Spend most of your time and energy trying to make life pleasurable, dignified and meaningful, for yourself and all of humanity. Let no tradition or orthodoxy or unverifiable dogma prevent you from this endeavour. Your primary duty is to yourself, the world you inhabit, and the beings within it. No one knows if there is life after death, there are only opinions, and opinions are diverse and often contradictory. So beware of those who pretend to know more than they possibly can know, especially when their opinions involve categorical demands on others against their will.
"Whether this is the only world or not, make the most of it and seek to understand and improve it in its own terms. God (if He exists) is not offended if you are happy and in love with life, he wants you to take concrete steps to improve your existence, using your reason and the evidence of your senses. God is so vastly your superior in every way, and it is an insult to his majesty and grandeur to think he concerns himself with mundane and petty rituals and doctrines. If he wants to impart some very important and specific information to you all, you may rest assured he can easily accomplish this feat without the slightest possibility of any ambiguity or misinterpretation. Therefore, be true to the earth and the reality of your lives, and strive to make existence as bearable or as happy as you can".
David,
DeleteYou won't be impressed by this "nifty" answer to why God remains hidden (since you've already heard it), but I would say Pascal had an interesting point when he said "there is enough light for those who desire only to see, and enough darkness for those of a contrary disposition" (P. 29). The problem is that many people actually "want to see" but just find too much "darkness" anyway (like Robert Lawrence Kuhn, according to his narration in Closer to Truth). So, as it turns out, neither of us are impressed by Pascal's nifty answer. I'll probably think about God's being hidden some more, and if there is any additional relevancy to Nietzsche or Pascal I will post about it.
Otherwise, it seems very strange to us both that the disciples didn't ask Jesus any of those obvious questions.
You're correct that the first gospel was written roughly forty years after the events it records. You're also correct that an empty tomb doesn't mean a miracle has occurred. I didn't mean by citing Ehrman that proved the resurrection happened. I meant that even a non-Christian considers the gospels generally reliable historical documents. We have, unlike with many stories of saints, evidence (historical evidence, not speculation) that a resurrection could have occurred--1. empty tomb 2. eyewitnesses claim to have seen Jesus after his death 3. the disciples (among others) actually believed Jesus rose from the dead, "despite having a predisposition to the contrary"--WLC (since Jews did not believe the Messiah was going die and rise from the dead). I disagree that the gospels don't constitute "serious and reliable evidence." To quote the book Reinventing Jesus, "The stories about Jesus and the sayings of Jesus would have been repeated hundreds, perhaps thousands, of times by dozens of eyewitnesses before the first Gospel was ever penned" (29). There would be probably still be eyewitnesses around to confirm or deny what was written in the gospels. It also takes, on average, a lot longer than forty years for myths and legends to infiltrate history. Take, for example, an adult who knew Pascal and told stories to his kid who later penned them--we don't say those stories are unreliable. One generation is not enough for serious corruption to take place, especially when that kid could go around and ask other eyewitnesses of Pascal.
Thanks for linking the reviews of Nagel's book.
Does Nietzsche anywhere talk about Paul, or does he only address Jesus?
What do you mean by "loving God"?
That story about the Franciscan monks is shocking. I would have thought they aimed to follow in St. Francis' footsteps, not compensate for their loss by torturing heretics. It does serve as evidence of Nietzsche's idea of ressentiment.
That message of religion's core seems the opposite of most religions' actual message, especially if--as you say--religion tends to NOT preach "affirmation of actuality." The message sounds like an affirmation of actuality (as you view actuality). Could you explain why you're construing religion this way?
Edarlitrix,
Delete"Evidence":
Plato spent a great deal of time explaining how pious fraud (as he saw it) should be (and could be) established in a society by the second generation.
Bertrand Russell: "Plato is right in thinking that belief in this myth could be generated in two generations. The Japanese have been taught since 1868 that the Mikado is descended from the sun-goddess, and that Japan was created earlier than the rest of the world. Any university professor, who, even in a learned work, throws doubt on these dogmas, is dismissed for un-Japanese activities".
Given that the majority of early Christians were uneducated people, socialised in an enviornment where critical thinking and scepticism were alien, without access to or knowledge of an interpretive method that is guided by principles of rigorous verification and falsification, i'd say that their beliefs, especially regarding such weighty topics as God, salvation, and eternity, are anything but credible.
Only the other day I was re-reading Tacitus (nothing to do with Christianity). At one point he talks about strange events being reported at significant periods in Roman history, such as a women giving birth to a snake.
I remember many years ago watching a tv programme about an American marathon runner (I don't remember his name) visiting China. It was probably related to Nixon's engagement with China. Anyway, he would run through numerous Chinese towns, followed by a film crew, and was flattered that, at each location, so many locals were lining the streets to see him. He admitted to being pleasantly surprised by this as he assumed he was unknown in China, so he asked one of his Chinese guides about it. The guide explained that many Chinese believed that Americans/Westerners had a tail, and so the crowds were there to see the tail of the foreigner!!
Religion and actuality:
I don't understand your question.
Nietzsche and Paul:
Nietzsche mentions Paul several times. He has a very low opinion of him.
e.g. If you can get access to Daybreak, see sections 68 & 72, this will give you a flavour of Nietzsche's opinion of Paul.
If you can't get hold of a copy of Daybreak there are some less than perfect translations of Nietzsche's works on line:
Daybreak.68. See here -
http://nietzsche.holtof.com/reader/friedrich-nietzsche/daybreak/aphorism-68-quote_e9a11aafb.html
Daybreak.72. see here -
http://nietzsche.holtof.com/reader/friedrich-nietzsche/daybreak/aphorism-72-quote_0402280d3.html
As I say, this website is far from ideal as an accurate translation of Nietzsche's text, so ignore it if you can get a copy of the book itself.
David,
DeleteI agree with Plato that legends etc. can develop by the second generation. The later gospels (ca. 90 AD) of Peter, Thomas, John etc. tend to be increasingly bizarre (e.g. a talking cross). I think that at least what the apostles taught about Jesus' life, though (as seen in their epistles--unless those are forgeries) would be credible, since they claim to be eyewitnesses. I doubt that pious fraud could develop within their own teachings while they were alive (unless their teaching was insincere).
My question about religion and actuality was why would you say that (referring to two paragraphs at the bottom of your post of 28 February) this is the core of religion's message? The core of religion's message seems the opposite of what you claim it is.
Thanks for pointing out where to find his views on Paul. I will wait to read them when I have the actual Daybreak book then.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteReligion and actuality:
Apologies. I thought I was clear that the spirit and content of those two paragraphs are fundamentally alien to religion. That's the point, as we both agree. Christianity is built on a negation of actuality and natural humanity.
This begs the question: why has hatred of reality taken such a hold on humanity? Why is it unable or unwilling to affirm actuality? And my embryonic response to that question is contained in the 7 point post of 19/2/13 above.
I do not see how being all-powerful is inconsistent with being changeless by nature, or at least an essentially changeless character that is not based on God’s arbitrary choice. Omnipotence is defined as follows: “God is able to bring about any state of affairs which it is logically possible for anyone in that situation to bring about. What this would imply is that God cannot do things that are logically impossible. God cannot act contrary to his nature or bring about infeasible worlds. But he can bring about any state of affairs in which it is logically possible for someone in his situation to bring about” (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/defenders-2-podcast/transcript/s3-16)
ReplyDelete“If God's status as an all-powerful being is (axiomatically) true, then it follows that God's character can be as changeable as He likes, and that if God is unchanging it is soley because He desires it (for his own, inscrutable reasons) and not due to any other source of constraint.” Being omnipotent does not entail freedom from all “constraints.” Since God would not be able to realize logical impossibilities, we could classify logical impossibilities as “constraints”—although someone might argue that logic is a part of God’s “nature” just as the “good” is, so that it is absurd to talk about logical constraints; God’s nature determines what is logical or something like that.
Acting contrary to his nature (which the definition of omnipotence denies) could include changing his character. The presupposition here is that God’s nature was not some sort of blank-slate that he could “draw on” as he pleased. Using reason and experience alone, I don’t see how we could say he did or didn’t desire himself to be changeless—unless we place merit on Aristotle’s “unmoved mover,” or “unchanged changer.”
This is where “perfect being theology” comes in. Perfect being theologians aim to maximize God’s greatness in describing the attributes of God. My problem with this theology is that it is based on intuitive notions of “Great.” Nevertheless, they would reply to your claim about omnipotence and God’s ability to change himself in a manner similar to this:
“When your friend says that an all-powerful being will have as few constraints as possible, he's giving expression to the typical Islamic view of God's power that trumps everything, even His own nature. God is so powerful that he could say to faithful Muslims on the Day of Judgement, ‘Ha, ha! I tricked you! I'm sending all of you to eternal hell for believing in me and my Prophet!’ On this view God is not constrained even by His own goodness. Now I disagree completely that this makes God a greater being. Quite the contrary, such a capricious Deity is morally flawed and therefore not perfect. We must insist that God's omnipotence operates consistently with His moral perfection.” http://www.reasonablefaith.org/is-the-islamic-conception-of-god-morally-inadequate#ixzz2JbTNeBx3
The idea is that if God is the “greatest possible being,” then he can’t make himself be something than what he already is: great. Nothing can improve him, and nothing can detract from him. If that were the case, then he wouldn’t be the greatest conceivable being. God’s omnipotence does not mean he can change himself, since that would mean he isn’t the greatest conceivable being. Technically, though, God could change himself if this change is not one that improves or detracts from him as the “greatest possible being.” I can’t think of an example of what kind of change that would be.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI'm aware that many theologians (and some historic philosophers) have attempted to delimit a priori what does, and does not, apply to (the concept of) God, and the notion of there being certain insurmountable "constraints" in the form of "logical impossibilities" is one such candidate.
I find these disputes to be much ado about nothing and inherently contradictory. If one accepts (as I don't) the notion of a personal God, who is Himself uncaused and the Prime Mover behind all phenomena, eternal and yet unfathomably complex, then such a being is already, ipso facto, not subject to our ideas of inherent "logical impossibilities".
Also, who exactly, and by what authority, is it declared that "God cannot act contrary to His nature"? Does God Himself have a say in this? These assertions, along with the "Perfect Being Theology" you cite, strike me as fanciful, highly presumptuous and lacking dialectical rigour. Moreover, they all seem instances of the "No true Scotsman" fallacy.
I also find it ironic in the extreme that a God who is depicted as supremely powerful is thereby described as "morally flawed" and therefore not (really) God at all; while a God who creates and silently watches over, for millions of years, the innumerable instances of suffering and cruelty endured by humans and animals, is behaving "consistently with His moral perfection".
This is a conception of "moral perfection" that, to me, beggars belief.
If one is determined to embrace a kind of Panglossian perspective as a means of glossing over the "problem of evil", then why not go the full hog and take sides with Spinoza and pantheism?
Let me end with a very obvious but important observation - none of this armchair hair-splitting and a priori philosophising about the contested CONCEPT of God brings us one step closer to any particular religion or alleged personal revelation. Nor does it ground any specific normative claim. And it is worth remembering that none of the monotheistic religions, in their founding texts, seek to seriously engage with these rationalistic or evidenciary concerns.
The very existence of theology, in my opinion, is proof that something is wrong with the whole enterprise, that things are not what they seem.
I'll let Nietzsche speak:
"A God who is all-knowing and all-powerful and who does not even make sure that his creatures understand his intention - could that be a god of goodness? Who allows countless doubts and dubieties to persist, for thousands of years, as though the salvation of mankind were unaffected by them, and who on the other hand holds out the prospect of frightful consequences if any mistake is made as to the nature of the truth"? (Daybreak.91).
David,
DeleteI agree with your views of Perfect Being Theology and a priori assumptions about God.
I agree with your point about the supremely powerful God being "morally flawed" while a God who remains silent during millions of years of human and animal suffering can get away with "moral perfection."
I'm not sure that the Koran and Bible fail to seriously engage with "these rationalistic or evidenciary concerns." At least when it comes to the problem of evil, the book of Job goes on and on about it. The "answer" given in Job is highly unsatisfactory to us humans, but I don't see why that implies the writer of Job wasn't seriously thinking and engaging the problem of evil.
Could you elaborate on why the existence of theology "is proof that things are not what they seem"?
The quote from Nietzsche is compelling to me. But, I know of a similar attitude from Christopher Hitchens. WLC seemingly refutes him:
"Well now Mr. Hitchens says, 'But why did God wait so long before he sent Christ? Human beings have existed for thousands of years on this planet before Christ's coming.' Well, what's really crucial here is not the time involved rather it's the population of the world. The population reference bureau estimates that the number of people who have ever lived on this planet is about 105 billion people. Only 2% of them were born prior to the advent of Christ."
(http://hitchensdebates.blogspot.com/2010/07/hitchens-vs-craig-biola-university.html)
Here's Hitchens' response:
"Dr. Craig talks as if, 'Ok, but since then they'll be more people born so it might have been a good time in terms of population growth,' well, there are a huge number of people who still haven't even heard of this idea [of Christianity]. The news hasn't penetrated to them, or where it has, it's been brought to them by people who Dr. Craig doesn't think of as Christians, such as Mormons, for example, and it's taught to them in many discrepant and competitive and indeed incompatible and violently irreconcilable ways." (from same debate)
Edarlitrix,
DeleteThe Book of Job & the "problem of evil":
The Book of Job, to me, is another clear example that, theological gymnastics aside, Might is Right.
Intellectually, the Bible doesn't really take the "problem of evil" seriously at all, because it will not and cannot present to the reader any sincere and rigorous non-theistic alternative.
In Shakespeare we find: "As flies to wanton boys are we to the Gods. They kill us for their sport."
Now this notion, as i've previously indicated, was not unknown to the Greek thinkers and even to the Greek religion itself. And some Greek thinkers entertained the possibility that the Gods were indifferent to human affairs entirely. Which, if any, of these ideas are true, is not the point. The point is that, within the context of the Bible, no decent and intelligent person is ever shown to be defending such thoughts, and consequently, such an outlook is never seriously engaged.
My guess is that if Job, or any another individual placed in a similar historical circumstances, were to maintain that God doesn't exist, or doesn't concern himself with human affairs, or takes pleasure in human suffering, he would not be intellectually challenged, or socially shunned for having such opinions, he would simply have been killed. And because having such opinions got you killed, such opinions were never seriously addressed, intellectually speaking.
Theology, for me, is proof of the human hand behind religion. If God wishes something of extraordinary importance to be clearly known by all humanity then there should be no need whatsoever for scholarly hermeneutics of any kind. If the meaning of Jesus, living and "dying" amongst us, is not concretely self-evident and unequivocal to all humanity, but requires intermediaries and scholars to interpret it for us, then that already assigns more de facto importance to the interpreter than it does to the life of Jesus.
Theology, by its very existence, presupposes that the acts and words of Jesus were not, by themselves, sufficient for humanity. And given this insufficiency, why did Jesus come at all?
p.s. Dostoyevsky's Grand Inquisitor passage is perhaps the most eloquent and heartfelt engagement with this question that i've come across.
WLC:
1. I seem to remember Jesus showing concern for even one sheep that goes astray, but according to WLC if over two billion human beings were born too early, that's not a problem!
2. Suffering didn't suddenly stop once Jesus arrived.
Nietzsche's point is significantly different from Hitchens's. Nietzsche's main point is that even after Jesus, it's far from clear what the whole point of his visit was, and that "getting things wrong", theologically speaking, can have the severest consequences. Hitchens, I take it, was stressing the actual suffering that people endured prior to Jesus's intervention.
David,
DeleteI'm not sure (probably because this is contradictory to much of the rest of the Bible), but I'm inclined to agree that the ultimate outlook of the book of Job has is "Might is Right." You are also correct that the Bible never presents a non-theistic viewpoint on anything nor an atheistic alternative to answer the problem of evil. But, Job actually doubts God's "goodness" and even seems convinced he is capricious or indifferent towards mankind:
"'Though I am in the right, my own mouth would condemn me; though I am blameless, he [God] would prove me perverse. I am blameless; I regard not myself; I loathe my life. It is all one; therefore I say, he destroys both the blameless and the wicked. When disaster brings sudden death, he mocks at the calamity of the innocent. The earth is given into the hand of the wicked; he covers the faces of its judges- if it is not he, who then is it?'"
(Job 9:20-24).
This one makes God out to be deceitful, unmerciful and unforgiving:
"'You [God] have granted me life and steadfast love, and your care has preserved my spirit. Yet these things you hid in your heart; I know that this was your purpose. If I sin, you watch me and do not acquit me of my iniquity. If I am guilty, woe to me! If I am in the right, I cannot lift up my head, for I am filled with disgrace and look on my affliction. And were my head lifted up, you would hunt me like a lion and again work wonders against me '"
(Job 10:12-16).
His friends try to challenge him (maybe not intellectually), but nobody tries to shun Job for his views (they shun him for other reasons) let alone even suggest killing him. His wife actually encourages him to renounce God, telling him, "Curse God and die" (Job 2:9). What's important to notice is that the book of Job, including its "unorthodox" complaints against God, is in the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. If they wanted to shut up dissenters, they would not have put the book of Job in the Bible--unless it was meant to refute dissenters since the final answer of God to Job is that Job is a finite human and can't know why God lets terrible things happen to good people etc.
As a side note, no where in the Mosaic Law does it say those who questioned God were to be killed. Sorcerers, those who worshipped idols and gods beside YHWH, and blasphemers of God were to be killed, but none of these crimes necessarily denotes questioning God.
You are exactly right that God doesn't need scholarly hermeneutics to tell the world something extraordinarily important and vital for salvation. I didn't mean that we can't know what God means or what Jesus means without an intermediary. When the apostles (you might contend that they were acting as intermediaries) preached the gospel, all that was required to understand was along the lines as follows: "Repent and be baptized . . . for the forgiveness of sins" (Acts 2:38)and to believe that "[t]hey put him [Jesus] to death by hanging him on a tree, but God raised him on the third day . . . [H]e is the one appointed by God to be judge of the living and the dead. . . . everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name" (Acts 10:39-40, 42-43). As far as I see, there is nothing scholarly about it. Anybody can understand the basic requisites. Based on what the apostles taught (derived from the acts and teachings of Jesus), Jesus' acts and words were indeed sufficient for humanity. These basic requisites seem to me self-evident and unequivocal to anybody who is told or reads about them. Even so, that doesn't mean nobody will deny them or twist them around. Of course, the "heretics" could level the claim that the "orthodox" are the ones who deny and twist things around. That's when "scholarly hermeneutics" and whatnot come into play.
I read the Grand Inquisitor passage, and it is a heartfelt engagement with the question. I'm sure it applies to some periods in history (such as during the Spanish Inquisition) when the Church went whacko and became too controlling and paranoid about theology and orthodoxy. But, I don't think it applies to the Church at all times and all places. The Catholic Church's current, official (though not actually maintained by all Catholics) view on this question can be heard in this 50-second video:
Deletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cGmLRSWuUwY
1. You have a good point; I agree that this is a discrepancy unless it be resolved by some "scholarly hermeneutics" or something similar. There is a somewhat ambiguous passage in the NT that might be relevant here. Some people interpret as referring just to believers in God before the coming of Christ, but that doesn't seem to be entirely accurate:
"For Christ also suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the spirit, in which he went and proclaimed to the spirits in prison, because they formerly did not obey, when God's patience waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was being prepared. . . . For this is why the gospel was preached even to those who are dead, that though judged in the flesh they way people are, they might live in the spirit the way God does" (1 Peter 3:18-20; 4:6). This constitutes an example of something that probably requires "scholarly hermeneutics" to get a good idea of what it means out of it. It sounds as though its saying those who died during the flood or before the flood (whose disobedience led to God eventually unleashing the flood) had a chance to hear the gospel and so be saved. In which case, at least some of those two billion people, "lost sheep," did not have to remain lost. If that interpretation of the passage is false, then of course it doesn't resolve the problem, but it's the best I can think of.
2. Surely nobody could disagree with this point. I don't think Craig was thinking so much of suffering, however, as he was ignorance of God/Christ, especially since Christianity claims that "there is salvation in no one else [but Christ]" (Acts 4:12).
Alright, I now see a difference between Hitchens and Nietzsche on the topic. I would add that Hitchens appears to be stressing not only the actual suffering people endured but also the impossibility that they would ever have a chance of "redemption" or recompense of that suffering in heaven because they were born before Jesus and never could believe in him (which might be resolved by the passage from 1 Peter mentioned above).
Edarlitrix,
Deletea)The Book of Job: At times Job speaks very eloquently (it's been a very long time since I read it), voicing his incomprehension at the apparent injustice of his lot, after initially enduring much pain without any serious complaint. Is it to the Bible's credit to publicise his complaints? I would say No, because none of his serious complaints (and many others I can think of that he never voices) are ever really answered and he is happy, in the end, to accept this substantive silence once he is confronted by God's superior power.
Given that Job is depicted as the most pious man on the face of the earth, the moral of the tale seems clear: If Job, in the end, can renounce all his questions and complaints and humbly submit to the inscrutable will of God in the midst of his extreme suffering (without receiving even the slightest morally comprehensible explanation from God), what moral justification do the rest of us have to question God's will?
b) Jesus: But saying Jesus died for our sins and through him we can achieve salvation is ambiguous and insufficient in the extreme, because Jesus, at no point in the Gospels, actually sets out and explains just what "sin" and "salvation" actually means and how these concepts are grounded.
c)The indispensability of Jesus's message: There are two different, but related, points here.
(i)Those countless millions who, for whatever reason, lived and died without ever having heard of Jesus.
(ii) Those countless millions who have read the Gospels (or have been informed of their contents by various intermediaries) and disagree profoundly (and often violently) on how it is to be interpreted.
Take Pascal himself as an example - Pascal is supposed to have been blessed by a personal revelation from, or a revelation sanctioned by, God, Jesus Christ. This is the most significant episode in his entire life, naturally enough. However, even after this visitation, we find Pascal, in horror and bewildering despair, freely confessing his ignorance of his "duty".
Something is clearly wrong here. If one of the foremost minds of the age, even after receiving a personal visitation from transcendence that confirms to him that Jesus is God and saviour, still agonises over his profound ignorance on some of the most important and pressing questions which may determine the fate of his eternal soul, then it is incontestably true that things are far from self-evident.
(c) The Grand Inquisitor: The historical wickedness of the Church and the Grand Inquisitor's own political (i.e. cynical/paternalistic) agenda, though important, are not the crux of the issue in question - the central issue is Christ's silence, his refusal to actually explain himself, his message and his methods. That point is as relevant today as it was 2,000 years ago, and no amount of sympathetic exegesis will make it go away.
Similarly, Pilate's perfectly reasonable question "What is truth"? remains entirely legitimate, and to repeat variations of the phrase "God/Jesus is truth" as a response to this question, is simply a way of avoiding the seriousness of the question.
David,
DeleteI agree with you about Job.
You're right to point out that Jesus doesn't expound on the meaning of sin and salvation. In the book of John, he talks about salvation a great deal, although he isn't easy to understand (hence the need for an interpreter). So, apparently he passed down the meaning to his apostles--and we have their writings, and from them we can glean what Jesus meant by sin and salvation. Then there is the question of what the apostles meant--the Catholics and Protestants disagree there. Sin, I believe, meant to the Jews transgressing God's law (as set out in the Torah). Salvation is more ambiguous though, and I hardly know what to make of it myself based on the NT writings. The Jews did not believe in a need to be "saved from sin" (they had ways to "atone" without Jesus); they believed in a need to be "saved from their Gentile oppressors." So, the whole concept of "salvation from sin" that Jesus brought onto the scene is alien to Judaism, I suspect.
I don't understand what you mean by Pascal's "ignorance of his 'duty" and "pressing questions which may determine the fate of his eternal soul." Which Pensées do you have in mind?
Well, I'm not Catholic, but I know the Catholic Church believes that Christ has not been silent, and that he has been explaining himself, his message, and his methods (not sure what you mean by methods--deeds?) through the Church throughout history. The Church is, after all, called the "body of Christ." The problem has never been Christ's silence; it's been man's weakness. The Bible has multiple accounts of how the Church fails in various ways because of its members (which Jesus despises, see Rev. 3:14-22). This occurs not because of Christ neglecting the members but by the members neglecting Christ. I doubt you will find that an impressive answer, but I think that's the answer the Church would give.
By "What is truth?" did Pilate mean "What's true?" or did he mean "What is the definition of the word truth?" Either way, at least some Christians who say "Jesus is truth" probably aren't trying to avoid the seriousness of Pilate's request, they're probably meaning it sincerely and gravely.
Edarlitrix,
DeletePascal's anguish: see Pensées. 429.
By "methods and means" I mean such simple, but unanswered questions as: Why did you come at this particular time and place? Why perform miracles? Why do we need to be redeemed? Why do children suffer and die? Why do millions of animals regularly have to kill one another? Why are you relying on fishermen and the like, unsophisticated and powerless people, to relay your message to the world? Why are you leaving us? etc
As i've said, Christ's silence in 'The Grand Inquisitor' passage mirrors his silence on these maters in the Gospels. In fact it's worse than that, in the Gospels no one even approaching Dostoevsky's seriousness ever speaks with Jesus.
But "Jesus is truth", whether true or not, is merely a succession of words. Neither Pilate nor the rest of us have any way of knowing why these precise words should be privileged over different successions of words saying very different things. We can't possibly believe that something is true simply because someone says it's true. We want evidence, and evidence is precisely what Jesus refuses to give Pilate and the rest of us.
I'm not sure how much further we can profitably go with all this. I don't wish to persuade anyone out of their belief. On the other hand, the notion of a personal, interventionist God, in any form, is one I cannot comprehend.
Two, rather different, if related, conceptions of God are often visible nowadays: firstly, a God-of-the-gaps; and secondly, a God of consolation or categorical moral demands. The first type is of no interest to me, nor science. The second type I gave up on a very long time ago. I appreciate that many worthy and respectable people affirm the second type, and, in a nutshell, good luck to them. However, it's most definitely not for me.
David,
DeleteI read the Pensées you cite, and I see what you mean about Pascal's anguish. But, I had always interpreted that passage not as Pascal's own experience but as his attempt to see the world through the eyes of a person searching for truth, perhaps a person who is reading his finished Apologia and considering what he says in it. That seems like speculation, but my reason for interpreting it that way comes from Pensées 427, when he says, "Who would wish to have as his friend a man who argued like that?" referring to three previous paragraphs written from the perspective of a person not searching for truth. The difficulty is that there is no context with which to interpret 429, unless you consider the sentence "I envy those of the faithful...." to be a context for the rest of the fragment. The context seems ambiguous, though. There is also Pensées 471, which doesn't square with Pascal's attitude in 429 (unless he is mood-dependent like Nietzsche, as you have mentioned). He does sound decidedly unhappy in 896 (see below).
I think that the only answer, albeit highly unsatisfactory to you, for Jesus' explaining himself and his "methods and means" could be the one given in Job--"what moral justification do the rest of us have to question God's will?" But then, I would like to know why, if God created us, he made us incapable of comprehending him. That failure to comprehend God leads to countless problems, like "why do children suffer and die?". The only supposed answer is the one of original sin, that we "used" to be able to comprehend God. But, then we have a problem Pascal seemed to share:
"My God, what stupid arguments! Would God have created the world in order to damn it? Would he ask so much of such feeble people? Scepticism is the cure for this disease, and will put this vanity in its place" (P 896).
Jesus did actually claim to give evidence, the evidence of "miracles." Unfortunately, that evidence only sometimes worked for those who observed it. There was also the evidence of Moses and the Prophets, and Jesus' words themselves, but that evidence apparently has been sufficient for hardly anybody.
I still think there are some false views (maybe overly narrow-minded) that both of us retain, and we can profit if there's mutual correction as needed. But, when we reach standstills or agreement on any topic (such as the Canaanite slaughter), it would be best to drop it. The problem of the hiddenness of God doesn't seem to be going anywhere; we basically agree on it.
I realize that you're not interested in changing your mind about God, but I hope that doesn't mean we can't talk about how Nietzsche and/or Pascal view God and your opinion on their views.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteYes, in a nutshell, I think Pascal was, like Nietzsche, very mood-dependent (in a very non-trivial sense).
One of the things that Nietzsche and Pascal agree on (and they agree on many important questions) is that our reasoning faculty is not an autonomous entity, over and above our emotions, instincts, impulses etc.
Pascal:"All our reasoning comes down to surrendering to feeling. . . Reason is available but can be bent in any direction. And so there is no rule". (P.530).
What this means, if taken seriously, is that some form of "mood-dependency" is always operative, in all of us, all of the time. And both of them are explicit in pointing out that we don't actually choose our own words and thoughts; rather, our thoughts and words emerge from a domain unknown and inaccessible to us.
These are scary and unsettling thoughts, but it's very difficult to refute them. This is partly why Nietzsche continually stresses the importance of physiology (if he were alive today he'd be fascinated by genetics).
N.B. When I stress "mood-dependency" I certainly don't mean to affirm some fashionable egalitarian pomo nonsense. The underlying "mood" or "physiology", all those largely unconscious psychological, contextual, and biological factors that are omnipresent; although these are shaping factors in our words and deeds, they are NOT the whole story. There is also a world of hard, stubborn facts and constraints which play their part in determining what happens. A "mood" is always there, in one form or another, but it doesn't follow from this that therefore everything is determined and explicable as merely the expression of our "moods".
p.s. Quantum Theory and miracles:
I'm curious. If QT is being used to show that religious miracles are indeed conceivable because the laws of physics don't categorically rule them out, then they surely become, ipso facto, not really miracles at all!
A miracle is, by definition, a suspension of the laws of nature. But if the laws of nature themselves can account for an event, that even cannot any longer be considered a miracle. The event becomes, at best, a statistically unlikely occurrence, but no miracle. In short, I don't see how QT helps the religious here.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI don't see any reason to interpret P.429 other than it is. The type of person that P.427 finds incomprehensible and shocking, due to their practical indifference, is nowhere to be found in P.429. On the contrary, P.429 is "troubled", in a "pitiful state" and his "whole heart strains to know" the truth.
The "truth" being sought, I take it, is the nature of Christ. I don't think Pascal ever takes seriously the idea of a Godless universe. I think for him it's just obvious that a God exists. But I think it's equally clear that, for him, Deism, or a theistic religion without Jesus at its core and summit, is both useless and terrifying, even if it's true.
Of course, for every passage where Pascal displays anxiety and scepticism regarding Jesus and the hidden God, there are far more where he is clearly devoted to Jesus and embraces him as his only possible redeemer. That's not disputed.
Still, it is all the more significant, I think, that in spite of his heartfelt longing, devotion, affirmation and commitment, doubts, of a significant and agitating kind, still periodically surface.
David,
DeleteThe mood-dependency theory (if one can call it that) does make sense.
I think that, considering your comments, even if P. 429 were a "meditation" on the attitude of some searching nonbeliever, it would be based on Pascal's own experience. I can understand how he would fluctuate between confidence and doubt. It seems he does so elsewhere, so it's probable P. 429 is just another dubious episode. My initial interpretation of it may have been influenced taking his "devotional" passages as the only way he felt about himself and God. You say that "I think for Pascal it's just obvious that a God exists." If we interpret P. 429 as Pascal's own feelings and thoughts, then he did at least once NOT find the existence of a God obvious: "If I saw no sign there [in nature] of a Divinity I should decide on a negative solution: if I saw signs of a Creator everywhere I should peacefully settle down in the faith. But, seeing too much to deny and not enough to affirm, I am in a pitiful state. . . ."
Alvin Plantinga agrees that a miracle is a "suspension of natural law"--at least in Newtonian physics. But that's not all, because "In the Quantum view, God’s intervention in the natural world is even easier to understand, according to Plantinga. Indeed, since the best that we can do scientifically is to give probabilities as to what a system will do, God can act by 'forcing' a particular event to come true, regardless of how improbable" (http://blog.drwile.com/?p=4450). Miracles are suspensions of natural law and/or the "forcing" of merely improbable events. The latter might reduce miracles to the non-miraculous, but it still would be divine intervention. Although, there's no way to "prove" it was divine intervention, since it could have happened anyway.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI disagree. I think P.429 clearly states that, for Pascal, there is "too much to deny". i.e. A God of some sort, clearly exists. However, because he sees "not enough to affirm" , i.e. not enough to clearly see Christ behind the "hidden God" he is "in a pitiful state".
As he says elsewhere: "It is not only impossible but useless to know God without Christ" (emphasis added).
It's the "hidden God" that troubles him, not the possibility that there is no God, but the possibility that Jesus is not God, or, that he has insufficiently understood Jesus's message and meaning. That's the gnawing doubt that agitates him. It's the fact that, in the final analysis, it's the heart and not the head, that affirms Jesus, that there is no sublunar way of knowing, with absolute certainty, that the heart hasn't made a mistake.
p.s. P.449 essentially makes the same point.
DeleteThinking back to the Catholic catechism and its claim that we need revelation to know certain things about God, and part of that revelation is supposedly the Bible, why say God is changeless if the Bible talks about God changing? The passages I thought of when you mentioned God changing would be the times he “changed his mind” because somebody prayed, or when he “repented” of creating mankind and started the flood as a result. I can’t think of an example wherein his character changed, or his nature changed (if you have one in mind, let me know—although what I’m about to say might apply to your example as well). Some people would say that the Bible talks about God from a human perspective, and therefore over-anthromoporphizes its descriptions of him. Talking of God changing his mind and whatnot are merely tools to telling the story. They shoudn’t be taken too literally or seriously. But, supposing that God can change his mind, does that mean he can change his character? I don’t think that follows necessarily, although some people may change their minds about who they are and thereby change their characters.
ReplyDeleteMy point about the validation of self-sustaining love on atheism: Chemicals in the brain seem self-sustaining. The brain generally takes care of and regulates itself, although some people need to take pills. Presupposing that everything can be reduced to the physical world, love would probably just be chemicals in the brain that encourage “attachment” and all things associated with “love.” There is no need for some sort of external validation that there are chemicals in the brain or the brain sustains chemical reactions that go on in the body and in itself as well as it can. It has always been doing that whether we knew it or not. So, love could be self-sustaining if it were just chemical reactions.
I now see that my claim about “self-sustaining love” on theism that loved irrespective of belief in God was out of touch with orthodox Christian theism. Any sort of natural reflex of love would not be “true” love on Christianity. Its existence is compatible with Christianity, but it would be some sort of selfish, preferential love and incomplete.
I am undecided on the question of whether life without God existing is “worthless, meaningless and contemptible” or if that description is going too far. If God does exist, it’s hard to comprehend how any “evidence” would ever arise that his nonexistence entails this or that. There never would have been a time when he didn’t exist and we could compare reality when he doesn’t exist with reality when he does. So, it seems like a helpless question. If God does NOT exist, then the same thing seems to apply. We wouldn’t know exactly what kind of difference it really would make if he did exist. It would all be theoretical and abstract, guessing games. I might change my mind about it someday, though.
Good point on human circumstance and belief in God. Would you say that the existential types like Pascal are on to something or are they just spouting an emotional, unverifiable perspective of the world?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteIf it is to be argued that God either doesn't, or can't, change his "nature" or "character" we need to be clear what we mean by these terms.
I would have thought that since salvation itself is often concieved to be essentially dependent on God's grace, that, surely, is itself proof that we don't in fact know what God's "nature" and "character" is (in the relevant sense).
But I was thinking of things like "turn the other cheek" and "love those that hate you". These sentiments are out of step with the predominant spirit (no pun intended) of the OT. Numerous examples of inconsistency and contradiction, on fundamental points, abound in the Bible, so I won't bother listing them.
Also, by analogy: if a tree grows a new branch, is it still the same tree? If I have a new experience, am I still the same person I was prior to the experience? In short, I don't believe in essentialism.
Of course, God could still, if He wished, entertain the most contradictory and antithetical moods, behaviours and opinions, yet keep His status as God, as the most powerful, the most supreme being and architect of the whole cosmos. But if that's what's meant by God being "changeless" then it strikes me as highly pedantic and only trivially true.
As I said, I simply don't see the point of a revelation and a holy book if it isn't crystal clear to everyone how exactly such things are to be interpreted. And the de facto result of this reality is that it puts power in the hands of "mediators" and "intermediaries", i.e. priests, etc, who, as all history shows, frequently disagree on fundamental things.
Didn't God foresee that this would be the inevitable result of such methods? The whole thing makes no sense to me.
I don't know enough about the concrete details of Pascal's life (inner and outer) to make an informed guess with any great confidence. Dostoyevsky is another believer who I greatly respect. Both these figures, for all their differences, were astonishingly gifted, but both were also in a great deal of spiritual pain. Some of their pain I can understand.
Generalising enormously, i'd say that for any sensitive, educated and thoughtful person, life can be very difficult, and there is no shortage of factual "reasons" and "evidence" to "justify" pessimism or despair.
On the other hand, it is certainly not necessary, or inevitable or "natural" to succumb to pessimism or despair. Nor is there anything "Romantic" or picturesque about it.
Simplifying greatly, Nietzsche would say that serious pessimism or despair, in most circumstances, is, first and foremost, the symptom of an overly sensitive organism, and that questions about "intellectual, emotional justification" regarding the external facts of the world are virtually irrelevent. i.e When we feel something, that isn't the external world forcing an emotion onto us, it is an expression of our own physiological and psychological constitution.
Nietzsche often uses the analogy of our stomach's "digestive capacity". Some stomachs can readily accept and assimilate, without too much trouble or serious consequence, all manner of "unhealthy", foreign, tasteless things into it. This is a strong constitution.
Others, unfortunately, cannot successfully digest and assimilate certain substances, and because of this (objectively) weaker constitution, the closer they get to difficult, raw experience, the more they vomit, or go hungry.
Edarlitrix,
DeletePutting aside for the moment those statistically rare "existential" types, it is clear the religion is overwhelmingly a mass phenomenon, a public rather than an essentially private affair.
Accordingly, this may (or may not) interest you: it has long been observed that among modern "first world" countries the USA is, by far, the most (nominally) religious. Why?
Many theories have been offered but there is now growing sociological research that indicates that belief in God is highly correlated with societal dysfunction, and that religiosity is inversely proportionate to the "general health" of a population. i.e. Those counties with higher rates of violence, incarceration, income inequality, corruption, sexual diseases, the availability of health care, etc, are more religiously inclined.
I don't suggest that this research is yet conclusive, but it does, I think, point in the right direction towards more mundane, contingent and practical reasons why most people are (nominally) religious.
One of the things that's always struck me as significant is that the overwhelming majority of the religious who profess to "believe" actually have little or no idea about the details and genesis of their faith. Nor do they take any steps, their whole life long, to acquire any significant religious knowledge.
The point is that the majority of humanity has never been "religious" except as habit, tradition, custom, parental and peer-pressure, historical contingency (time and and place of birth and upbringing) and intellectual laziness. Almost none of them have seriously thought about the details of their faith, they merely parrot what's expected of them, with the minimum of fuss. The idea that God would be at all impressed with this kind of tokenistic affirmation has always struck me as absurd and blasphemous. Religion, to most (nominal) believers, is on a par with belief in the efficacy of lucky charms.
The point may seem rather obvious but it's no less significant for being so. All this would seem to suggest that, for most of humanity, religion has always been, ironically enough, an essentially practical and worldly affair, however much appearance suggested otherwise.
David,
DeleteI don't really know what "nature" and "character" mean fundamentally. The best I can come up with is "what someone or something is similar to" or "what properties can we ascribe to that someone or something."
Could you explain why you find the doctrine of salvation by grace as "itself proof that we don't in fact know what God's 'nature' and 'character' is."
I understand by "turn the other cheek" that we aren't supposed to "get revenge" on people. I see this attitude even in the OT. Moses is slandered by his sister Miriam. God makes her into a leper, and then Moses begs God to heal her. Moses doesn't say, "Ha ha, Miriam, you got what you deserved" (even if she did deserve it). But, there was a time when David killed a messenger because the messenger claimed to have killed King Saul. That seems like a form of revenge in a way. So, the OT has a mixture of stories complying and contradicting the "turn the other cheek" attitude.
I might not fully understand your tree analogy, but it why couldn't the tree be the same after growing another branch? It is not suddenly a different species. The analogy does not seem conclusive to me.
By the changelessness of God, some just mean God is timeless. The only way for there to be change is if there's time, and if God is timeless, he can't change. Of course we have no way of knowing any of that. There are also some who do think God can change his mind etc (all of whom deduce this from reading the Bible). So, your point about the ambiguity of Scripture is well taken.
My example of people disagreeing on the "changelessness" of God supports your point that "the result of this reality is that it puts power in the hands of 'mediators' and 'intermediaries', i.e. priests, etc, who, as all history shows, frequently disagree on fundamental things." They do frequently disagree. But, the Catholic church is strongly against disagreement on fundamental things. Those who disagree with the Catholic church usually do not have solid reasons for interpreting Scripture the way they do. The Catholic church does as far as I have seen. So, the disagreements are not all equally viable and can be sorted through. The Catholic church claims that God DID foresee schisms and whatnot, and provided the Church as an "infallible interpreter" to guard against heresy. The "development of doctrine" over the centuries is supposed to serve as some form of evidence for this claim.
Nietzsche seems to be on the right track with his stomach analogy.
It's sadly true that many religious people are religious unreflectively. I also find that disturbing, especially since (thinking of Christians) the NT strongly advises (if it doesn't command) believers to "grow in knowledge" (2 Peter 1:5, 8). I have talked to people who seem to have the "unreflective" attitude and their reasons for being so are that to actually reflect on one's religion and try to "figure it all out" releases too much stress. It does, but that has only worldly connotations as you mention and provides no benefit in the "afterlife."
I think that the correlation between social dysfunction and belief in God could be interpreted as follows: Those who have a comfortable existence are overly satisfied with their worldly goods, whereas those who have an uncomfortable existence have come to see the futility of worldly goods etc., and therefore understand their "need for God." But, you could then interpret the latter case as people thinking, "I don't have the ability to be rich, therefore riches are futile." They have such a poor lot in this world that they think ahead "to the next," and the "rich" people are preoccupied with this world. But, you could say that poor people are religious just because that gives them a reason to be at peace with their lot in this life. I also don't know if these studies say so much about religion as they do about people. People like to use religion for their own selfish ends, rather than aiming to "serve God" (although that could be a selfish end, too).
DeleteEdarlitrix,
Deletea)Grace: I'm referring to the fact that no one can be sure they're going to heaven, which is another way of saying that the standard being applied by God is unknown to humanity. And because it's unknown, because it can't conform to any formal and explicit criterion we can recognise and articulate, this betrays the fact that we don't understand why God is choosing as he does. Ergo, we don't understand him at all!
2. Your Moses example won't work because it is not universalised, as it is in Jesus. Where in the OT does God ever tell humanity to love those that hate you, and turn the other cheek, always and forever, unconditionally?
3. Tree analogy: are you aware of Hume's conception of the self? See also Pensées.688. and think of the problem of God's supposedly 'unchanging nature' as you read it.
4. Catholicism's consistency on fundamental matter? Is Pensées.950., for example, part of this consistency?
5. Some of the most atheistic countries on earth are the Scandinavian nations, which, as far as I know, are not a hotbed of immorality, corruption and despair. The USA is significantly wealthier than these nations and has a very large middle class, so it isn't simply a question of internal economic disparity (i'm assuming here that many middle class Americans are also religious?).
But, as an atheist, I can't even begin to serve a God I don't believe in and can't possibly understand. Therefore what concerns me is the earth and the life and conduct of those in it. If the creator of the cosmos wants to impart some important information to me then i'm all ears, but the first task he'll have to accomplish to get me to seriously listen is to convince me that it is actually Him who is speaking. I see no evidence that this has ever, or will ever, occur.
In the words of Richard Feynman:"The stage is too big for the drama".
DeleteI think, deep down, many religious people know this. When Europe was most devoutly religious, and for most of the last two thousand years generally, illiteracy was the norm. Almost everyone was perfectly happy with this state of affairs, and saw no reason to change it. Even today, many of the most religious countries in the world have a strikingly high degree of illiteracy.
I conclude two important things from these facts:
1. The theocrats in power, while nominally proclaiming God's word, were intent on keeping it to themselves.
2. And, even more shockingly, the illiterate masses were largely content with this arrangement, and saw no need to demand that they acquire the skill necessary to read for themselves the words of the God they so unequivocally believed in.
This tells me that, in the profoundest and sincerest sense of the the word, the overwhelming majority of people have never been religious at all, no matter what appearances say to the contrary. And, as i've said previously, the idea that God in his omniscience would be unaware or unconcerned with this fact is, quite simply, ludicrous.
David,
DeleteI don't think that the NT necessarily teaches the uncertainty of where we'll be in the afterlife. Jesus talks with certainty about ways people can "enter the kingdom of God" (Luke 18:18-25--unless whether we actually fulfill those requirements is uncertain, though Jesus no where says this). In the epistles, the apostle Paul at least sounds pretty sure that he's going to heaven (2 Cor. 4:17-18). The book of Hebrews warns against ways one can fail to attain heaven (deliberate sin), but it no where says "you still can't be sure where you'll end up even if you do fulfill all the requirements."
I ultimately have to admit, though, despite the biblical "evidence," a person's temperament will be what influences his certainty of whether he's going to heaven or hell.
There are in fact commands relating to the attitude of "love your enemy" and "turn the other cheek" in the OT.
"Do not say, 'I will repay evil'; wait for the Lord, and he will deliver you" (Pro. 20:22).
"Do not say, 'I will do to him as he has done to me;
I will pay the man back for what he has done'"(Pro. 24:29).
"It is good for a man that he bear the yoke in his youth. Let him sit alone in silence when it is laid on him; let him put his mouth in the dust—there may yet be hope; let him give his cheek to the one who strikes, and let him be filled with insults" (Lam. 3:27-30).
"If your enemy is hungry, give him bread to eat, and if he is thirsty, give him water to drink, for you will heap burning coals on his head, and the Lord will reward you" (Pro. 25:21-22).
"'If you meet your enemy's ox or his donkey going astray, you shall bring it back to him. If you see the donkey of one who hates you lying down under its burden, you shall refrain from leaving him with it; you shall rescue it with him'" (Exo. 23:4-5).
I am ignoring all concrete examples in the OT of characters obeying what they are told here and/or disobeying it.
If you are thinking of the verse "eye for eye, tooth for tooth" (Lev 24:20), that is not meant to apply to personal relationships with other people (for example, a brother is eats his sister's candy because she ate his), rather it is a standard for judges to use when sentencing judgment on criminals. That doesn't mean the verse hasn't been twisted to apply to personal relationships, but that is in conflict with other biblical verses that do more evidently apply to personal relationships (which I have cited above).
Also, I don't think "turn the other cheek" is unconditional. That principle doesn't mean parents shouldn't discipline their kids. For example, in Mat. 18:15-17, Jesus clearly is not advocating a "turn the other cheek" ethic:
"If your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault, between you and him alone. If he listens to you, you have gained your brother. But if he does not listen, take one or two others along with you, that every charge may be established pby the evidence of two or three witnesses. If he refuses to listen to them, tell it to the church. And if he refuses to listen even to the church, let him be to you as a Gentile and a tax collector."
I was not aware of Hume's concept of the self. I looked it up and am guessing you mean "the bundle theory of the self." I understand the analogy now in light of that. Are you saying that, given Hume's concept of the self, God doesn't even have an underlying "nature"?
I think I spoke too soon on Catholicism's consistency and agreement on fundamental matter. Technically, any religion is "consistent" on fundamental matter since no religion randomly changes its fundamentals, but maintains its principles. It's the adherents of the religion who change. Catholics have obviously changed their minds. Martin Luther is an example. None of which scores points for Catholicism.
DeleteYour point about the apparent irrelevance of "economic disparity" and religion isn't one I thought of before. Most middle class Americans, are religious. They aren't, as far as I have seen, as fervently religious as those in poorer countries, though.
You earlier mentioned how we can't know God's reasons for his choices, and "ergo, we can't understand him at all!" Well, I don't know whether you agree with Pascal here, but he says (from the perspective of a person failing to look for truth), "'I do not know who put me into the world, nor what the world is, nor what I am myself. I am terribly ignorant about everything. I do not know what my body is, or my sense, or my soul, or even that part of me which thinks what I am saying, which reflects about everything and about itself, and does not know itself any better than it knows anything else'" (P 427). Basically, we humans barely understand ourselves (if at all), so whether we can understand God or not should not be anymore of a problem than it is for us to understand ourselves.
What, to you, would constitute evidence that God is behind any communication?
It wasn't until Luther translated the Bible into German (although I think there were some English translators of the Bible before Luther) that the illiterate masses became interested in reading it. It was illegal to translate the Bible (which supports point 1.) and that may have influenced the people to keep their interests in reading (if they had any) out of sight. When the printing press came along, the masses had more access to books--or they may have been too expensive--and there was a point to becoming literate. The reasons behind the theocrats keeping God's word to themselves was supposedly to prevent heresy. Interestingly, once the laymen got to read the Bible for themselves, thousands of denominations resulted (not all at once, though). They were "afraid for men's souls." Now you might point out that is a superficial cover for power, and maybe so, but it doesn't therefore seem like an illegitimate cover. I must concede though that the Church could have gotten along fine without keeping the Bible to themselves, since the ancient Christians had Scriptures in their own homes. Of course, none of this applies to illiterate countries today.
Overall, though, I don't understand why this means the "majority of people have never been religious."
Edarlitrix,
DeleteI'm simply not familiar enough with the Bible to offer any informed response to the passages you cite. I would need to have a very specific understanding of context and attribution before I responded with any confidence to these passages, so i'm afraid i'll have to remain silent here.
I'm aware that, for example, 'The Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs', written 109-107b.c., contains several passages that sound very close to what Jesus (in his most pacifistic and loving form) was advocating.
However, for me, to state the obvious, Jesus is not divine and the Gospels are not, and cannot be, accurate representations of the man called Jesus. Although I believe that behind and underneath these later accretions a real historical figure (Jesus) actually existed, I have no way of separating fact from fiction, regarding the words, acts and events of Jesus's life.
What this means is that, for me personally, the word "Jesus" represents an exemplary kind of historical "good man". This is essentially a free creation of my mind, it is not grounded in credible evidence, whether historical or textual. It's an image, a visceral archetype, in my head, in the same lazy way that the words "Hitler" and "Attila the Hun" represent certain kinds of barbarity, in my head.
In a nutshell, the "bad" things attributed to Jesus (e.g. the fig tree, the swine hurtling over the cliff, the damned receiving judgement) I simply treat as fictions; and I treat only the "good" things (e.g. love one another) as belonging to Jesus "proper".
Now why, you may reasonably ask, do I operate according to this overtly self-selecting, almost childish and arbitrary principle?
Answer: because if Jesus was actually otherwise, and the things I consider "bad" can be authentically attributed to him, then I have no interest in him whatsoever (because, for me, he is no longer a worthy symbol of an exemplary kind of human being).
Hume etc: I wouldn't say that God (as a concept) couldn't have an "underlying nature", because for God perhaps all things are possible; how can we possibly know?
But, I am saying that if God does have a unitary, fixed, eternal "nature" it would be impossible for us to identify it and recognise it, because all we can ever see/experience/conceive is God's qualities, God's actions, God's attributes (whatever they may be), and we would find it impossible (I would argue) to identify some unconditionally changeless substratum beneath and behind all of these things.
God's status, as the supreme being, may be an eternal, unchanging fact, but status is not to be confused with God's "nature". In trying to identify God's nature we run into the same problems that Hume (and others such as Nietzsche with his critique of the concept 'Subject') identified in regard to ourselves.
If we try and imagine God shorn of all his actions (i'm conceiving his "thoughts" and "feelings" as types of actions), what remains over? What is left that we are calling "God"? What is God's "nature" in the absence of any actions?
And if God's nature is determined by his actions, is in fact constituted by them, and his actions are manifold and various, then it would seem to follow that his "nature" is neither static nor dualistic.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteEvidence for God? Proof of God?
From my paltry human perspective, I don't see how "proof" of anything whatsoever is even possible. This is an embarrassing epistemological problem that philosophy has never been able to solve.
Consequently, I can't see how God could ever prove (conclusively, definitively, absolutely, without the slightest possible trace of doubt) to us, or even to himself, that he was, in fact, God.
But, because humanity can't fathom a way out of this epistemic abyss doesn't necessarily mean that a way doesn't exist. Perhaps there is a way God could offer proof of his existence, who can say?
If we then forgo absolute certainty as a hopeless quest and rest content with affirming something with an extraordinarily high degree of probability, would very strong "evidence" be possible for God? What would convince me, practically speaking?
Many people have pondered this question and it has provoked many responses among atheists.
If, for example, the laws of physics appear to have been broken in a very explicit and incomprehensible manner, so that, for example, a piece of text, or a booming voice were to appear in the sky, simultaneously to every human on the earth, in every appropriate language, proclaiming religion X and subsequently answering every intelligent and profound question it was asked to everyone's satisfaction - would that be evidence enough for God?
Practically speaking, I think I personally would accept it as authentic. However, it could simply be a hoax carried out by an alien civilisation far superior to our own, and there would be no conclusive way of ruling this possibility out completely. But, as I say, practically speaking, yes, I would believe.
Others have speculated that God may have signed his name (in the appropriate language) in every atom, or perhaps every gene etc. Again, practically speaking, i'm pretty sure I would accept it, even though I couldn't rule out the alien hoax possibility.
Many more scenarios can be imagined as candidates. But, in the final analysis, demonstrations of vast power would render me obedient but wouldn't be very persuasive. What I would want, more than anything else, were reasons, explanations, answers, coupled with a willingness to listen.
But every sophisticated conception of theology that i'm aware of makes clear that God (in his inscrutable omniscience) doesn't want to be known in such a fashion (a very convenient doctrine).
Lest the most important thing go unsaid: whether there's a God or not, in my view, is not the most important question. The supreme questions is: Is there a God who cares?
Imagine the unparalleled despair, terror and anxiety if it was proved true that there was indeed a God, but that He wasn't at all concerned with our well-being? Who would draw comfort from such a momentous discovery?
I'm principally an atheist, not because I think the concept of a God is incoherent or indemonstrable in Nature (it isn't), but because a God-who-cares is.
Edarlitrix,
DeleteIt all depends on how we define "religious".
No one denies that countless millions of people are (nominally) very religious, and that their consciousness has been dominated by religious allegiance of one sort or another, as well as their behaviour.
The fact that almost every "religious" person acquires their religiosity via chance, circumstance, geography, parentage, peer-pressure, historical location, and various other clearly contingent factors is almost never addressed by believers. For the vast majority, their religiosity is not, and never has been, the result of a hard-won spiritual and dialectical struggle, no serious soul-searching ever takes place, no serious evidenciary and epistemic problems are ever encountered (or if encountered are quickly overcome), and no sustained engagements with critical points of view are sought.
If religion is viewed primarily as a sociological or political or cultural phenomenon (usually corresponding, historically, to some pre-existing in-group / out-group dynamic), then religion is indeed a mass phenomenon.
But what about the content, intelligibility and epistemic status of the the doctrines that supposedly lie at the very core of a faith? These are supposed to be the hallmarks of our encounter with the Divine, the content that legitimises all our subsequent words and behaviours, and yet, almost no one (statistically speaking) applies any significant time or energy in exploring these things.
People put their trust in the judgements of their peers or religious intermediaries, again, without spending any significant time and energy in establishing the probity of these interpreters. Apparently, these people must think that God isn't overly concerned with the content of your actual beliefs, or the effort you've put in to acquiring your beliefs; he's content to forgive you for letting others (who He has not personally authorised) do your thinking for you, and if, as a consequence, you get many things totally wrong, well, it's no big deal.
This is a very strange conception of God, a God who is concerned with interpretive hierarchy and group cohesion, but is fine with individual laziness, obedience, gullibility and docility.
All this merely demonstrates that organised religion is overwhelmingly a sociological phenomenon, a power centre characterised by ignorance among the general population and a thirst for power among the interpreters.
I can't accept the "heresy" argument. Almost all dogma (of any kind) began as heresy, and "orthodoxy" is merely a resulting equilibrium that arises after earlier power struggles over interpretation. (see, for example The Emergence of the Catholic Tradition, a scholarly work by Jaroslav Pelikan 1971).
Are we to believe that the masses themselves didn't want to educate themselves in order to be able to take responsibility for their beliefs? If so, it's not to God's credit that he's happy to embrace such "believers".
In the case of the elite themselves: if the masses are to be treated like children and told what to believe, why did Jesus waste so much time conversing with them? Why is there no record in the Gospels of Jesus conversing with sophisticated theologians and moral philosophers, outlining in minute detail the resolution to every conceivable theological quarrel? Why didn't Jesus do theology and metaphysics? This would give the subsequent interpreters a solid foundation from which to proceed in relating to the ignorant and obedient masses.
I only ask these questions rhetorically. Organised, doctrinal religion is the invention of a priestly class, with the uncomprehending approval of the unknowing masses. Once you accept that, all the obscurantism is essentially explained.
My apologies - my view on these matters, though sincere, is unworthy of future discussion, and benifits neither of us.
One important thing that I have so far failed to mention in relation to Pascal's Pensées is that certain very obvious questions are strikingly missing from it - in particular the "problem of evil", as regards the human species, and, more generally, the issue of animal suffering that, numerically at least, dwarfs all human suffering.
ReplyDeleteIt is hard to explain this deafening silence on Pascals' part, given how sensitive and alert he was regarding suffering. And this leads me to suspect that he was in flight from his own intellectual conscience on this question, a question that any genuine moralist cannot fail to be aware of.
The God that Pascal (and every other 'good' person) wants to believe in is, among other things, a God who loves and cares for his creations. How this longing is to be reconciled with the suffering endured by the countless innocent infants among the human species has never been made satisfactorily clear by any theologian. Didn't Pascal see any difficulty here? Why did he choose to stay well away from this heartrending question?
And similarly, why is he silent on the immense suffering routinely endured by so many of the other species on this planet? The sheer scale of this perpetual agony staggers the mind, but, if we are trying to make sense of existence in moral terms, as virtually all religious people claim, then i'm afraid that this commonplace horror and suffering calls out for an explanation. Or, if explanation is too ambitious a request, at least a serious response is required. Pascal, i'm afraid, has no response at all.
My apologies if I seem morbid and overly bleak here by highlighting these ugly facts, but in the final analysis, we are either serious about these questions or we are not, and if we are, we have no moral right to ignore them.
The following video clip gives a hint of the immense squandering and suffering that many trillions of animals have endured, and, unlike the human adult, we can't simply evade their suffering by saying that God gave them free will and the capacity to choose good but, against all wisdom and morality and opportunity, they perversely chose evil. Animals don't have that choice, they are innocence personified.
WARNING! This clip shows Golden Eagle's killing young goats by dragging them off a high cliff to their death. Anyone especially sensitive or vulnerable to nihilistic despair is advised not to watch it. It is horrific and heartbreakingly sad.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VklTs-Tid_I
David,
DeleteIt seems to me that Pascal was possibly planning on addressing the problem of evil based on notes in his Pensées. First of all, he often mentions the "corruption of nature" (P. 6), which might include animal suffering. He talks about man the monster (P. 130), so I suspect free will (or just "choice") being a cause of evil is something he had in mind. I don't think he was avoiding the problem of evil because it was something he couldn't explain satisfactorily. He may have thought he had a "satisfactory" answer but didn't think the problem of evil was important enough to mention in detail. I have in the past dismissed the problem of evil as "not a big deal" (and I thought it was easily answered by William Lane Craig). Pascal was probably not as superficial as me, but I can see the possibility that he just didn't take the problem of evil "seriously."
I watched the video, and I couldn't help notice that the other goats who witnessed the death of those killed did not seem too disturbed or at least as upset as many humans are at the sight of these things. They just tried to chase the eagle away, to keep themselves from getting killed as well. They don't appear traumatized or bothered. I know some animals may be upset by the death of a mate or children. Most animals don't appear to care a great deal though, and get over their loss quickly (unless I'm over-generalizing here).
There is a response by Michael Murray in his book "Nature Red in Tooth and Claw" to the problem of animal suffering. Here is a highly condensed version of one of his answers:
"A second (though unpopular) response to this problem is to deny that animal pain and suffering is real or morally relevant. Most will react to this response with incredulity: 'Isn’t it just obvious that some animals experience pain and suffering?' The answer to that question is yes and no. We do think it an item of common sense that animals experience pain and suffering. But the scientific evidence for this is not as strong as you might think. Of course, scientists all acknowledge that many animals display behaviors that make it look like they are in pain. But that is not good enough. To see why, consider the phenomenon of 'blindsight.' Patients with blindsight claim to be blind, and yet are at the same time able to point to objects and, in some cases, catch balls--something they could only do if they could in fact see. So are they blind or not? Well, it depends on what you mean by 'sight.' They can see in the sense that they can use visual information to regulate their behavior. But they are not consciously aware of the fact that they can do this.
When it comes to pain, then, the question is: might the behaviors that we associate with animals that look to be in pain constitute something like 'blindpain'--showing all the behavioral symptoms of real pain, but without the conscious awareness? Amazingly, given what we know about the functioning of the brain, the answer might be yes. Those parts of the brain most closely associated with consciousness of pain, are also the parts that were the last to arrive among mammals: the pre-frontal cortex" (http://www.reasonablefaith.org/animal-suffering1#ixzz2OnFJaEXD).
The definition of the pre-frontal cortex and what sort of creatures have it is actually debated, so I doubt that Murray's claim at the end is totally sound.
What would constitute a "serious response" to the problem of evil for you? Free will? "Corrupt" nature (as Pascal leans toward)?
Edarlitrix,
DeleteThe problem of evil can only be avoided or "answered" (within a theistic perspective) if you subscribe to the view that the God you worship is, above all, a God of power. In which case, all praise and admiration of God is nothing other than prudent obedience to a being who can harm or reward you according to his own arbitrary will.
I find that a thoroughly horrific, hopeless, unnecessary, masochistic and deeply misanthropic attitude. I would go as far as to suggest that all this is really just an elaboration and development of primitive folk religions and fertility cults, and is the result of either scientific ignorance or an unwillingness to understand the natural world as it is.
I'm sorry, but the Murray quotation is simply absurd.
A "serious response" would have two aspects. Firstly, it would have to have a genuinely visceral and sympathetic aspect in confronting the immense horror involved (something WLC evidently lacks). Dostoyevsky is the most powerful writer i'm aware of on this point.
Secondly, a "serious response" would have to demonstrate a high degree of conceptual sophistication, but without any obscurantism.
N.B. A "serious response" is not the same thing as an adequate and coherent answer and solution. A "serious response" only shows that the subject is being taken seriously and that the attempt is worthy, on moral and intellectual grounds, of being critiqued.
The (theological) problem of evil persists because most believers simultaneously affirm two antithetical and irreconcilable viewpoints: God is omnipotent and God is loving. These two axioms are groundless, and without any supporting credible evidence (empirically and conceptually). But, groundless though they are, believers want to believe them, and in desperately trying to reconcile the irreconcilable they are often forced to abandon all logic and human sympathy.
This is not a serious intellectual problem at all, it's primarily a problem of psychology and sociology. It would be like having contemporary alchemists. Their axioms are so wrong-headed that no amount of education in molecular chemistry is likely to have much of an effect. They are alchemists for reasons that have nothing to do with chemistry.
What do you mean by "conceptual sophistication"?
DeleteDo you know of any responses to the problem of evil that fulfill the two aspects you mention (perhaps Dostoyevsky)?
What are your specific reasons for viewing the existence of evil as incompatible with a loving, omnipotent God? It seems that when we talked about this in the past, we just took it as given that no loving God would allow evil, but I'm beginning to question that.
Edarlitrix,
ReplyDeleteDostoyevsky's engagement is heartfelt and brutal, and for this I give him great (moral) credit. His "answer", as far as i'm aware, is visceral and ineffable. In a less sensitive and honest writer this would be, I think, an appaling dereliction of moral duty. As I said, Dostoyevsky engages with the question, but doesn't pretend to resolve it. He can't resolve it, no one can (unless, of course, one understands the concepts of good and evil as depending entirely on God's arbitrary will).
As i've said, I don't see this question as a serious intellectual problem at all. In no other sphere of life do educated adults behave this way.
There are problems that may be solved, or intelligently addressed, by a priori reasoning, and those that can be solved or addressed by empiricism. The idea of an omnibenevolent, omniscient, and omnipotent God defies all logic and all evidence, and it's only psychology and sociology that keeps (for some people) the question alive.
I can't think of any other subject where otherwise reasonable and educated adults continue to investigate a subject which has neither logic nor evidence in its favor.
I don't think I have anything new or significant to say on this subject. Anything I said would just be a restatement or elaboration of things i've already said. For me it's a non-issue. The question of "evil" is an existential and practical question of great importance, but for me it's not a theological question at all. It's a question entirely of this world, and trying to make sense of it by reference to some other, transcendent, indemonstrable, inaccessible world is a distraction.